the US is being held hostage by the GOP. built upon the twin pillars of guns and religion they use ignorance hatred and fear to strip the rights of ALL citizens not only the ones foolish enough to vote for them. that we sit idly by as they destroy our country, murdering immigrants minorities and soon women is just shocking to me. i suspect we on the left naively believe that laws or justice will prevail. but how can laws save us when a large segment of this population get their news from fox and their views from a deranged authoritarian psychopath who believes he's above it? i have no hope for november's election or the future of this country. he will start a war before then. and if that doesn't work another civil war will do.
29
Actually, the title to this opinion piece should be "life after Casey" because the more recent Casey decision established the standard for assessing permissible restrictions on a woman's right to seek an abortion, the "undue burden" standard. Of course, even the educated readers of the Times are not, for the most part, aware of Casey, and so the title refers to Roe; like referring to a "gun" (a piece of artillery), rather than using the proper term--pistol, rifle or musket.
As a lawyer, I'll bet the U.S. Supreme Court never overrules Roe outright for the simple reason that such a ruling would no doubt be a split versus unanimous decision, and as such would be seen to do too much damage to the hallowed legal principle of stare decisis. Besides, it is politically safer for conservatives who oppose Roe to bleed it dry by little cuts than decapitation.
I would also be willing to bet that Kavanaugh will be confirmed by the U.S. Senate as the next justice to the U.S. Supreme Court. The author of this opinion piece, by words, has metaphorically rent (torn) her clothes, shaved her head, donned sackcloth, and dusted herself with ashes--so much more dramatic than doing the real work, the hard work, of seeing to it that a judge who is more aligned her own political views were appointed as the next justice. But don't worry, it only takes 30 to 40 years to correct such a mistake.
10
And how on earth is the author supposed to "see to it" that a judge aligned to her political views is appointed as next justice? She has no power to do that. So she does the thing she can - write an opinion piece to ensure that her viewpoint is heard.
18
We’re clear what’s at stake. What can we do?
13
As will be the case, the stench of hypocrisy remains in that those with means and the need will go where they wish to receive an abortion and as usual, it will be those women at the lower end of the economic spectrum who will be "left out in the cold" and some will inevitably die.
Meanwhile Republican states and their lawmakers whom either ban or severely limit abortion will also limit sex education classes for their students and any and all means of birth control and certainly disallow government funding for it. Sadly, it will be predominately men whom are locked into an archaic backward mentality that will be making laws that affect women.
9
An America that would pass laws restricting a women's right to an abortion could as well (for the health of the unborn child) prevent her from consuming alcohol so long as she is of child bearing age, limit her ability to drive or operate heavy machinery, monitor her menstrual cycles for deviations (easier than it may sound) and control her life in a thousand and one other intrusive ways.
39
Certainly Roe is important to many in our country, but it is not why the Republicans actually want Kavanaugh on the court. They may tell their constituents that but what they really want is a pro-corporate lackey. Kavanaugh will use the court to bolster corporate America as a person when need be, and a corporation to exonerate any personal accountability when they are in legal jeopardy. He will also use his position to put corporate interests and profits over consumers, as we have seen in cases like Italian colors vs AmEx and the recent AmEx vs Ohio. His anti labor views are well know. Mitch McConnell could care less if anyone has an abortion, he's in it for the monied interests!
35
From a humbled Irish man, please learn our lessons guys. Realize what a poisonous and toxic discourse around women's reproductive healthcare and sexuality does to a country.
It really is poisonous and it causes a lot of pain and misery for so many people out there. Trust in the agency of women, protect Roe.
68
Republicans are not pro-life. They are pro-coat hanger. Period, full stop, end of story.
43
It's kind of hard to reason with a faith that believes all humans are inherently evil as result of female fertility. Christianity seems to have skipped over a couple chapters in the Torah. They went straight from Genesis to the New Testament and took a wrong turn when they got there. The "virgin" part of the Virgin Mary is a pretty clear warning signal. We're kind of barking at the clouds when it comes to abortion. These people will leave you to die on the street but menstruation is apparently a sin. Go figure that logic.
Interestingly enough, humans are one of the few species who menstruate at all. Biologically speaking, humans are weird. The theories vary but they all come back to a proven concept known as "spontaneous decidualisation." In effect, the body is partially in control of the entire pregnancy process. The feminine womb is somewhere between welcoming home and hostile defender when it comes promoting life. Mom is defending her own life as much as she's welcoming your's. Menstruation appears to be an evolutionary defense mechanism against unwanted or unhealthy pregnancies. So is missing periods due to physical stress or malnutrition. Your body is telling you something.
That said, my evolutionary instinct as a man is naturally protective. If someone close to me wants an abortion and Roe is overturned, Canada is within driving distance. I don't see what the religious right is truly trying to accomplish. My religion doesn't ban abortions. What gives you the right?
21
The rich will still get abortions; the poor will risk their life to terminate a pregnancy in some way.
20
Truth of the matter is that Roe has been dead since 1992 and the decision in Casey. Because of that case , the states that oppose abortion are working to stop the practice in its tracks with little or no opposition from a conservative court.
Accordingly , the overturning of Roe will result in what we already have , blue states that are pro choice and red states that are anti-choice. What any of this has to do with governance is a complete mystery. And now that the Court has 'textualists ' , we will be told that the matter is not recognized by the Constitution . which is true . So the issue will now become governed by the individual states.
Some day . when the penny finally drops , women too will be treated as full fledged citizens and will have the opportunity to deal with their own reproductive health issues rather than being treated like brood sows by a government that is never supposed to comingle any religious dogma with the business of the government. At least that was what was proposed in the very first amendment.
16
"Roe rejected the argument that fetuses, at any stage of development, may be treated as if they are separate constitutional persons under the law."
After that, the criminal law in many states was amended, so that criminal harm to a pregnant women that causes her to lose the pregnancy is charged as murder of the (unborn) child.
This was a curious alliance between abortion foes and women's rights proponents seeking to maximize the penalty for hurting a woman. Courts have upheld that.
If it is murder of the unborn for a third party to do it, then it is a small step to make it murder for an abortion.
I don't advocate that, but I warn that one cannot assume Roe is protection on this point. Things have happened since, already happened.
3
After the most recent shocking revelations about the systemic child sexual predation in the Catholic Church and the pervasive coverup of it by its leadership, why would Catholic woman any longer follow that Church’s rigid edicts and strident opinions concerning acceptable family planning methods and pregnancy issues. It has clearly forfeited any existing moral authority to speak and influence the conduct of women on such matters. Let this institution of single, supposedly celibate, men “clean up its own house” before telling autonomous, sovereign women what or what not they must do.
42
One arrest was too many. Let’s be clear about that.
33
When you read this over-the-top rhetoric, did it not remind those of you with long memories of Sen. Ted Kennedy's attack on an earlier Supreme Court nominee, Robert Bork?
Has a Senator ever sunk so low?
Kennedy said: "Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, writers and artists would be censored at the whim of government, and the doors of the federal courts would be shut on the fingers of millions of citizens for whom the judiciary is often the only protector of the individual rights that are the heart of our democracy."
In 2011, New York Times columnist Joe Nocera wrote that "[t]he Bork fight, in some ways, was the beginning of the end of civil discourse in politics...The anger between Democrats and Republicans, the unwillingness to work together, the profound mistrust—the line from Bork to today's ugly politics is a straight one."
13
Any woman of moderate means will be able to obtain an abortion out side the USA. - Not easy, but doable. It's the poor who will suffer - as usual. They will be unable to terminate an unwanted pregnancy, and with the republicans curbing social programs, she will sink deeper into poverty and perhaps homelessness. The child, in dire need, will turn to crime in order to eat. Go to jail and maybe end up on death row. Unbelievable how concerned the right-to-lifers are so concerned about a fetus, but not about a life.
41
It must be repeated over and over and over that neither Brett nor any of the so called "pro lifers" cares one wit about the lives of rape victims. They REFUSE to act on issues like untested rape kits or the offensively short sentences rapist get. But if a rape victims seeks an abortion they will bring the full might of the law and other methods to stop her. Including changing the law. Rape kits? 30 days for getting caught raping someone? no, these arent issue that they consider even remotely important. And Brett is no different.
42
If the Anti-Choice supporters could get past their black and white extremist ideology, then they would be pro prenatal care for women who can’t afford it, they would be supporting Planned Parenthood for offering free pre-natal check ups and women’s healthcare to all women in need. They would support family planning and try to reduce unwanted pregnancies. Last time I checked, having an abortion isn’t something any woman plans or wants... so helping women and teenager girls to avoid unwanted pregnancies makes sense. The abstinence only Right wrong agenda is just a lazy way of having to avoid “uncomfortable topics” like sex. If these self-proclaimed Christians really cared, they would be doing very thing they could to increase our country’s dismal mother/ infant mortality rates. We are ranked far behind most develop countries. What a bunch of hypocrites!
48
A decision overruling Roe v. Wade would mean that an individual has no constitutional liberty interest in matters of reproduction that the state may not control through legislation. If the state wishes to advance its compelling interest in preventing abortions, however, it is targeting the wrong gender. A law that mandated that all males receive vasectomies at the age of 16, if strictly enforced, would largely eliminate unwanted pregnancies and the need for abortions. The law could provide that males could have their vasectomies reversed after being married at least one year and with the express written permission of their wives. Any male who then impregnated a woman other than his wife would be guilty of a felony and subject to imprisonment. Of course, the mere notion that state legislatures dominated by men would ever intrude on the reproductive choices of men in such a fashion is absurd.
57
When abortion is returned to the states, and women are thrown in jail for controlling their bodies, I fully expect these states to institute mandatory organ donation from everyone not capable of carrying a pregnancy.
If fertile women are forced to sacrifice their bodies for someone else, it is only fair that everybody else give up a kidney, chunk of liver at least some bone marrow. Since a small but real percentage of women die on account of carrying a pregnancy, I guess it would be logical for some unlucky folks to have to give up their heart.
Chilling, but a logical analogy.
24
Then there is the increase in crime that will happen about 18 years after eliminating Roe when the unwanted children come of an age to commit serious crimes. Who is going to pay for that.
19
@Riverwoman From a cynical viewpoint that is a desired outcome because it justifies harsh, authoritarian measures. Those measures can, in turn, seem perversely calculated to have little effect on the underlying problem.
That pretty much describes US domestic policy on drugs since the start of Prohibition.
I reference Senator Morris Shepard (Texas of course) the "father of Prohibition" on whose property a large still was found (BTW no evidence he was involved AFAIK) .
7
@Riverwoman
Reduced crime is one the big benefits of 3 strikes laws. But now a bunch dimbwits want to empty the jails for "non violent" offeders. They just were not caught doing violence. How do you thikg an unemployed junkie pays for their two or three hundred dollar a week habit? Mugging little old ladies, and property crime. It might be non violent but nobody likes their car or home broken into Let the junkies stay in jail. If jails are too expensive outsource them to Mexico.
3
Kavanaugh's assurance about Roe being "settled law" does not mean that he will not vote to overturn it.
The statement about "settled law" is a dodge, a subterfuge, and a red herring.
We might as well get used to it. With Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court, Roe is dead. And with it, thousands of women will die and more will have their lives irreparably damaged. That is what we get with reactionary right-wing judicial appointees.
A vote to confirm Kavanaugh is a vote to kill women.
28
It is not hard to cherry pick legal cases in a country of 300 million where judges did stupid things that were later overturned. If states are allowed to regulate abortion to death, as the confirmation of Kavanaugh will make likely, it will be important to change hearts and minds to make this a losing political cause for Republicans in as many states as possible. It is a sign of the utter failure of abortion activists like Ms. Paltrow that popular views on abortion rights have moved backwards since 1973, when abortion was suddenly handed out as an entitlement, rather than a privilege gained state by state democratically. Had there been no Roe v Wade decision, I can only believe we'd be a lot further along in the battle to win abortion rights democratically by now. Look at how far gay rights have moved over the same period, and women's place in society overall. It will be a long hard battle, but regaining abortion rights democratically in state legislatures is the only solution looking forward. The good news is that convincing the public, rather than 9 Ivy League judges in Washington, stands a much better chance of producing permanent change.
3
@Tom:
>>> ". . . when abortion was suddenly handed out as an entitlement, rather than a privilege gained state by state democratically."
You're confused, Tom. The Supreme Court, in Roe, recognized that a woman's choice to terminate pregnancy is part of the *right* to privacy guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.
Government doesn't "hand out" rights, it merely recognizes them.
16
@Tom- what a fantasy ! I have lived through the era of “state-shopping,” the nightmare of traveling to a state with ‘favorable’ parameters to obtain a legal abortion. It was not a time of fairness. It was a time of despair and horror. What world do you live in, that you think states are bastions of fairness ? Texas, closing down women’s health centers? Red states who feel they have the right to read your medical files ? Republican controlled states, where American rights don’t matter unless you’re a billionaire ? Wake up.
14
@Tom
Why this idea that people oppose legal abortion because it was “handed out as an entitlement”? Was the end of segregation “handed out as an entitlement”? Should we have made equal rights for black Americans a “privilege gained state by state democratically”? There is no state that has the right to force women to carry babies to term. Forced incubation is wrong in Indiana, wrong in Alabama, wrong in Idaho. Legal abortion is not an entitlement. It is an acknowledgement that women have ownership over their own bodies. All women, no matter where they live in these United States. And the idea that in our modern, mobile US a woman in Mississippi could be incarcerated for having gotten an abortion while a woman in Vermont obtains one easily and legally - well, that is not going to last. Just as state laws prohibiting interracial and gay marriages were overturned because it was absurd to have a legal marriage in Massachusetts be a crime in South Carolina; it will once more be an absurdity that a healthcare procedure in one state is considered murder in another. We are one country. Time for the religious zealots to face up to that fact. Abortion is never going away. Advocate against it; support pregnant women; teach: cajole; this is all perfectly constitutional and right. But the country deserves uniform laws. It also deserves law that serves all citizens, not just religious extremists.
9
If the Republicans don't overturn Roe with Kavanaugh, they are salivating over Trump getting a 3rd Supreme Ct. nomination when they will do just that. I'm a donor to Planned Parenthood and have recommended that they build their next clinic north of the U.S.-Canadian border or south of the U.S.-Mexican border to prepare for this. I also predict that within a decade of outlawing abortion, pregnant women will start dying of complications like ectopic pregnancy and preeclampsia at which point there will be a national public outcry to hold a national referendum to vote to make it legal which just happened in Ireland. That may have to wait until the 2040s when caucasians are no longer the majority race in this country so the GOP will not be able to dictate their false morals on the population, but that will happen eventually.
15
When I looked up some abortion history, I found that in my state, a woman wishing to get an abortion could apply for permission. The case would be referred to a 3-person panel to whom she would present her arguments. The history didn't say how these cases ended up -- how many approved and how many denied. But certainly the system did not fall into the dicotomy of "abortion is legal" or "abortion is banned".
Last month an article in the Times put Georgia in the list of states where abortion is likely to be "banned". Did they think Georgia has gotten more conservative since 1973 ( I don't thinks so) or are their studies still trying to squeeze all possibilities into a simpleminded "banned vs legal" mold?
3
@Charlesbalpha:
>>> "The history didn't say how these cases ended up -- how many approved and how many denied."
Let me help. In 1968, the combination of reported and estimated abortions in Georgia was 168. In 1974, the year after Roe, the number was a bit more than 22,000.
http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/usa/ab-usa-GA.html
4
Please stop using the "pro-life" description in your articles. The people concerned are "anti-abortion". If they were pro-life they:
--would be in favor of reproductive education including the use of contraception so that accidental life would be rare.
--would be in favor of vastly increased/improved post-natal care, and support for young mothers and their children.
As it is, they are only pro-fetus. Once the baby is born, it's on its own.
86
Here's a strange idea. Let's all wait for Judge Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings before predicting the abortive apocalypse! He will no doubt be questioned intensely on the subject, and we should hear what he has to say instead of rushing to judgement. As for the protesters in the photo, my suggestion is to drop the street theater and show us what women in need of health care really look like, instead of the costumes which most people don't understand anyway.
3
@David Godinez During his confirmation hearings, Clarence Thomas testified under oath that he had never even discussed or considered Roe v. Wade. He said "I have not made a decision one way or the other with respect to that important decision." Nine months later as a Justice on the Supreme Court, Thomas joined a dissenting opinion declaring that Roe v. Wade was wrongly decided and should be overturned. Such is the candor of a nominee's testimony. More relevant is Donald Trump's campaign promise to nominate only justices who will vote to overrule Roe v. Wade.
39
@Charles L.:Hey the honorable judge has already stated publicly that Roe is settled law. Now of course anybody could lie but then would anybody ever get to the court?.
3
This article makes clear that the real reason Republicans want to overturn Roe vs. Wade is that if abortion becomes even more illegal, it will become a mechanism to incarcerate women. The formula has worked well in the context of arresting Black men for selling pot. Once abortion becomes federally illegal, it will provide opportunities to incarcerate women. It's a profitable business for the top of the private sector and the government.
25
Please READ ROE! All of it. Viability is key. If the life can survive at a certain point, such is the point to stop. Unless the life of the mom would be at issue.
4
@Mary D-The whole issue of abortion hinges on when life begins. Some people say it's at conception, therefore all abortions should be banned. Some say it's not until a full-term child is born. Some say it's at 20 weeks, or 24 weeks, or some other time when a premature baby can be born and survive. But, in reality no one knows the answer to that question, and the arguments and legal battles will continue until someone can definitively determine when viability takes place. Since it's doubtful that will ever be known, the abortion debate will continue.
2
Evangelicals can talk about “life” and “saving babies” forever, but the anti-abortion rights crusade Is truly about controlling women and the need to feel pious by judging others. What a young woman does about a crisis pregnancy affects no one but herself, and no one has any right to weigh in or bring the force of law to bear on her decision.
In Kavanaugh’s view, virtuous women would never have an unplanned pregnancy. If by some remote chance they did, he would expect them to show appropriate shame and go away.
Sadly, he will probably be confirmed.
32
So, what about the woman who is forced to have a baby she never wanted? What about the child who know the same thing?
Will biological fathers shoulder their responsibilities?
Who must wear the scarlet letter?
10
Hyperbole and scare tactics won't stop this Nomination. States still get to decide even if Roe is overturned. Anyone really believe a Blue State like New York or California will ever outlaw abortion? Seriously? And that's in the unlikely circumstance Roe is even overturned. Some restrictions on late term abortions might be put in place in some states. Hardly turning the clock back to the 1950's.
6
Since we know full well that women will resort to illegal and dangerous abortions should Roe be overturned and that some of them will die in the process, it's worth asking ourselves just what sort of medieval-minded person would want to condemn our society to that.
Our country was founded on the ideas of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment! The GOP would return us to the Middle Ages.
By the way, it's worth noting that the late Senator John McCain, when he thought Hillary would win, publicly stated that the Republican Senate Majority would go four years to keep her from putting a single justice on the Supreme Court.
21
For those who sat out the last election or voted green party? Best of luck to you. This is what you get. I am a guy and cannot get preggie. My ex-wife suggested we get an abortion but we didn't. Abortion is such a personal choice that men need to stay out of the conversation. Too bad the religious-type just can't help raining their beliefs on the rest of us. Look at the church now...not very credible...they have a major mess on their hands.
11
Of course, it will only be poor people who will suffer. The wives, sisters, daughters, and granddaughters of GOP lawmakers will be protected from unwanted and unhealthy pregnancy and will always be free (wealthy, powerful enough) to get an abortion.
27
These are dire times for all American citizens. Kavanaugh's appointment to the SCOTUS will cement a predictably Trump-sympathetic majority, resulting in the final collapse of the system of checks and balances and the final development of dictator Trump. The end of abortion rights will hardly be the only repressive legal measure to directly affect our lives.
It's happening. See the article today about how Trump is refusing to release the White House records needed for properly vetting Kavanaugh, and how Grassley and the Republicans are purposefully violating the confirmation process.
Reminder: there is one last hope to change the current backward direction of the country, and that is to rebuild a Congress that will do its duty to put an end to Trump's abuses of power. That means one simple rule of thumb. In November, vote for any candidate that is NOT Republican.
16
And remember to vote against any Senator that votes to confirm this man! Make them aware that there is a cost, a personal cost to them.
17
I'm terrified and sickened. The "Dead Beat Dad" campaign is a parasol in a hurricane. Chip off Roe v Wade and I would like to know when will it be set by unequvicoal law that both parents in reality, proof, and fact, have to endure and cement this 18-year responsilbilty into their life plan. And I mean tagged and monitored by law or "work center" subsidy. If this derailed both lives, and both parents had to truly pay, support, and donate 50% of their conscious future existence - Roe v Wade would be a legacy set in stone.
16
Abortion is the individual’s choice. If the State objects and rejects Roe, then the State should foot the bill for the birth and continued care of the baby to age 18.
16
It's coming - the showdown between freedom of religion and freedom from it. The abortion fight is the pinnacle, as it pits the certainty of the religious that abortion is immoral, murder, against the certainty of the the pro-abortion movement that it is not, and that women are being savaged as a result.
I am Catholic, and I believe abortion immoral, based on my failure to know when in the continuum of development a fetus becomes a person. I hold myself to that standard. I hold NO ONE else to it.
Because fundamentally it is a question of philosophy not science: when does a group of human cells become one of God's own?
Kavanaugh cannot answer that, nor can the Justices, any more than I can. And the government should not be in the business of defining God's creation and giving it greater rights than the living, breathing, citizen who is carrying the fetus.
I don't know that women will end up jailed as Roe is overturned slowly by a death of a thousand blows. But I do know that women will lose jobs because they miss work for morning sickness, and their other children will suffer; and I know that women will be burdened with responsibility mandated by the government with no resources to assist; I know that women will be marginalized in the jobs they need to support the government mandated child because the child will not schedule illnesses, homework or teacher meetings conveniently. I know child care will hinder them - they should have the right to choose that life.
19
Question to both my liberal and conservative friends...
Is reversible 5 to 4 court decision a good way to make laws?
The real problem is that anyone of 500 federal court judges can overrule both the executive and legislative branches. This is chaos.
So called judges need to be reigned in to the constitutional limits of power. This begins by appointing conservative judges.... remember conservative judges don't make laws... that has-been a liberal monopoly.
2
@obummer
" . . . remember conservative judges don't make laws . . . ."
Are you kidding? Citizens United? Janus? Hobby Lobby? All foisted on us by conservative judges who in your world of "alternative facts" don't make laws.
16
We get it. It's just that there isn't anything we can do about it, as far as I know (I mean, the Kavanaugh nomination). We can't vote on this. We can support women who need to have abortions, but if anyone has other ideas let us know.
3
People get caught up in arguing about the legality of abortion, who's on the left and who's on the right but this fails to miss the most important point.
We are a race that kills its own. We may want to deny that this is what we are doing or we justify it on the basis of our fear of the suffering that will come to us if we don't. But this is what we do.
Whether we are looking at fighting wars or executing criminals, disposing of the unborn or attacking gender minorities, for centuries we human beings have decided that certain other human beings should not live. So we kill them.
Until and unless we resolve spiritual and learn to love and respect all people, changing laws will make little difference.
4
Outlawing abortion strikes me as so backward as to be laughable. I can't imagine any modern society in which safe abortions are available to women who want them reverting to a time when they no longer are. Why not outlaw female driving--and miniskirts too--while you're at it? But if the GOP and its crazy base prevail on this, we really are going to have to get a lot more serious about prosecuting sexual assaults against women, both inside and outside of marriage. Any woman pressured into a pregnancy she doesn't want should see the man who did it behind bars, or even facing the death penalty depending upon the severity of the offense, whether she initiates that prosecution or not. Since the ramifications for women seeking to maintain their God-given independence will be so much greater, the state will need to be very aggressive against men who until now have gotten away with much more then they should. This will have to become a society in which men understand that they just can't mess around. Their sole legitimate intent will have to be to become committed fathers with willing women, for the duration. Those are the same sorts of values that many self-styled conservatives want to apply to women, and we're going to have to get to equality one way or another.
10
It is anti Constitutional that new justices are chosen to fulfill the desires of a small section of the population. Kavanaugh is a fanatical right winger whose opinions are so horrible the republicans will not release many of his writings. He is anti choice, anti gay, pro unfettered authority to the Executive branch, ignoring the Separation of Powers intent in the Constitution. He'll be another vote for more campaign finance abuse, as well as having lied in his previous confirmation hearing. With the abuse of McConnell over Merrick Garland, as well as the realistic possibility that 45 is illegitimate, tied to Russian interference, this nomination itself should be aborted.
16
We have no one to blame but ourselves. We elect the people who do this. Since we have elected representatives who are making this happen it must be what we want, right? If this is not what we want we need to elect different senators, governors, representatives, presidents. But we seem to hate non whites more than we care about women's rights. We seem to care about guns more than than we care about women's rights. We hate alternative gender identity more than we care about our female citizens. How do we change this?
7
This should not even be an issue in the United States. Ever.
The 13th & 14th amendments to the Constitution abolished slavery & defined persons under law, The 1st amendment prohibits governmental enforcement of one person's religious view (which includes when morally significant human life begins) upon anyone else.
Nobody thinks anybody else is entitled to use your body against your will to accomplish some purpose. That is slavery Still less should a more or less differentiated group of cells have any moral claim over a woman in which it has come to reside.
(The very same people who think America doesn't have to accept the continued residence of actual born people just because they managed to evade border protection. think a woman has to accept the continued residence within her own body of an entity that managed to escape her own defenses.)
A woman is under no legal obligation to give a blood transfusion to her own newborn nor can you take any organ from a corpse without his/her prior permission.
Under law, rights begin with birth.
One religious view of human personhood is that persons often are reborn into animals. If religious views, rather than observable experience, are entitled to write law, meat eating would be banned.
Morally, as Kant said, a human person is an end in herself. She is never a means to an end, a thing to be used for others' purposes
Even more repugnant is if the other's purpose is to secure what he thinks is his own ticket to heaven at her expense.
20
Anyone who truly wanted to drive down the already falling number of abortions should demand sex education, emotional intelligence training, universal healthcare and free contraception in every city and town (including middle schools, secondary schools, and universities.) Expand Planned Parenthood so that pregnancies are wanted and able to be physically and emotionally supported. For those who still say that sex education and free contraception are the devil's work because they promote promiscuity - your red states have far higher teen pregnancy rates than blue states have, so that argument is long over.
Keep abortion SAFE, RARE AND LEGAL - and practice the freedoms you've been demanding from our government by keeping your mind OUT of MY bedroom.
25
It's unfortunate that Ms. Paltrow felt the need to drag legalization of psychoactive drugs for getting high into this article. The reason that drug offense arrests have increased is that illegal abuse of drugs has been successfully promoted by various corners of society, both the "high" and the "low". I believe Ms. Paltrow knows that, and that she also knows that it has very little to do with keeping abortion legal.
2
As troubling as overturning Roe v. Wade may be, there is a much broader and more sinister movement at issue here - that is whether a minority can impose their religious beliefs on the rest of the nation.
Kavanaugh and the conservative judges who are on the court now are dedicated to advancing the agenda of the Christian Right, that is to make this a Christian nation with laws consistent with the beliefs of the Christian Right.
What makes it all the more frightening is the hypocrisy the Christian Right has embraced - backing the likes of Donald Trump so long as he agrees to advance their agenda. You have to ask what else will they allow Trump to do to achieve their ends?
20
@Don Carder. It will also put another Catholic on the Court and their religion opposes abortion.There will be six Catholics on the Court- five men and Sonja Sotomayor.
6
Ludicrous scare tactics. Overturning Roe will not make abortion illegal; it will merely return the issue to the states. Pharmacological abortions have rendered the "post-Roe" world absolutely not comparable to the pre-Roe world. Even the legal outrages described in the article were exceedingly rare. At this point, it would be relatively easy to depoliticize abortion altogether by eliminating its run ins with the legal system. Pills, trained medical volunteers, paid plane fares and clinic fees, and an atmosphere of merciful quiet would take reproductive issues private which is where they should be. But then how would people like the author of this piece make a living?
5
@GrumpaT
You do not understand the anti-abortion argument. According to their orthodoxy, all fertilized eggs are persons and must be born. Period. To them, so-called “medical abortions” -those obtained by taking pills - are in many ways more insidious than medical procedures, because they are private and hard to catch. If Roe v. Wade is overturned, there will be a huge push to make “abortifacients” illegal or so severely restricted that they are near impossible to obtain. There will be prosecutions of people who sell/distribute such drugs. Many forms of birth control will be deemed illegal because they are considered to cause abortions. The anti-abortionists will never let up because they think God will punish them if they do. It is that simple.
1
Kavanaugh was born into, nurtured, educated, and put on his career path by the Republican Party kennel. Not much doubt how he sees the world -- filling in legal gibberish for his inevitable decisions will be left to his chosen cadre of radical right clerks who will come to us courtesy of Harvard, Yale and other "top tier" law schools.
Two thoughts. I have never understood why no Democrat has ever made a central issue of the plank in the 2016 Republican platform which demands an end to all abortions, including those to save the life of the mother. Hillary in her feckless way gave Trump a nice pass on that one. I also have never understood why Democrats will not contemplate expanding the number of seats on the Supreme and Appellate courts to counter the toxic effects of a 30 year Trump court system. Can be done by a simple majority vote in Congress, a Democratic President willing.
But when did Democrats ever have half the focus and spine of Republicans?
12
Excellent article. It only neglects to state why anti-abortionists are so adamant about making abortion (as well as family planning and birth control) illegal. It's all about the fear of the wrath of an imaginary god, a fear they wish to impose on everyone. As for the likelihood of a miserable life for the mother and unwanted child she'd be forced to deliver thanks to Kavanaugh, the antis couldn't care less. Next stop: mandatory church membership and attendance.
If you don't believe in abortion or family planning, don't do it.
17
Problem is that those who are pro life, are only pro life until birth, after birth, they just don't care what happens to that child, not going to feed it, not going to provide medical care for it, not going to educate it. Irresponsible.
29
Read the book The Story of Jane: The Legendary Underground Feminist Abortion Service by Laura Kaplan. Someone should make a film about it.
Before Roe, a group of women got together to figure out how to help others get the abortions they needed. It was the original Do It Yourself (DIY) movement. But a woman can't really do it all by herself. She needs help in that situation. It may come back to that when Roe is abandoned.
Women's groups should prepare now for that situation. Learn how to do abortions and figure out who can help. We may be on our own once again....
15
It is pretty clear that the new white nationalist Republican plan to maintain a constant supply of cheap labor is to prevent poor women from getting birth control or having abortions. Since the party has been taken over by nativists, immigrant labor can no longer be counted on.
So what will they do to sustain their business model, which is based on the availability of cheap labor?
They will force poor women to provide it. Women with means will leave the country for their abortions. Women without will become the brood mares for the cheap labor the Republican white nationalists' short-sighted, unregulated capitalist system requires in order to sustain their lousy business plans, which cannot survive if labor becomes more expensive. If labor were more expensive, then where would the billionaires come from? Nobody would be able to reap massive profits for themselves if they actually had to pay employees living wages. Oh, the horror!
Vote them all out in November. Don't cast a single vote for any Republican, anywhere, and send the party a strong message that we are not going along with their plans, and we will not be instrumentalized by greedy men who in reality care nothing for morals and are interested only in their profit margins.
32
The judiciary in the US is corrupt, from the Supreme Court down through all the federal courts, thanks to manipulation by Conservative Republicans. The foundations of democracy are crumbling before our eyes.
16
In the 1950s, I saw my older school friend almost bleed to death from botched self-abortion -- stabbing in herself with a knitting needle. So much blood. Can't go back. There was so much blood. In the deep night, we buried the blood-soaked towels in the ravine. We could not tell anyone. You. will. only. end. safe. abortions.
41
Rare – after reading something on the NYT opinion page – have nothing to say…
More so, when a piece weaves so open-endedly into geography and history I didn’t know…
(i.e. nearly all geography and history out there)
*ttps://watermark.silverchair.com/JHPPL382_09Paltrow_Fpp.pdf
Left me speechless…
But – then…
*ttps://www.nytimes.com/1971/12/04/archives/shes-fighting-conviction-for-aborting-her-child.html
Left my lower jaw on the floor…
Prosecutorial polemics against a most vulnerable member of our society could’ve been picked from yesterday’s NYT…
“…Horace Smith, the prosecutor, said charges were filed because for the first time authorities had both proof of the abortion and a “corpus delecti” (the fetus)….The authorities learned that…when Miss Wheeler was about 3½ months pregnant, she had gone to an abortionist who inserted a catheter to cut off supplies to the fetus and thereby induce a miscarriage…
“…We, of course, could have made some arrangements if she had turned state's evidence against the abortionist,” Mr. Smith said, “but she told us it was none of our business…
Have nothing to say…
Horace said it all, a half-century ago – and channels through others to this day…
PS
*ttps://statelaws.findlaw.com/idaho-law/idaho-abortion-laws.html
“…The pregnant woman who knowingly gets…an abortion for herself, other than lawfully provided, also commits a felony…
Unless Kavanaugh articulates how he’d assertively counter the JimCrowing of Roe v Wade…
In a word – no…
1
Welcome to hell where providing a woman with a bus ticket or ride to an abortion provider will make you an accessory to murder.
Possibly even a bus schedule will cause you to hang.
Don't discount the limits of madness in controlling women for a moment.
That attitude got us here.
Women in red states who are not organizing and screaming at the top of their lungs may see their sisters and daughters die from sepsis, or if they survive rot in prison.
30
Anyone who thinks that we are one step away from the Handmaid's Tale because some conservatives want to reduce access to abortion is deluded. Women in the US are more free and earning more money than any other time in human history, indisputably. Can society to more to root out serial predators and place women in positions of power? Sure. But to believe that the US is on the verge of sanctioning institutionalized rape and forced child bearing is simply not reality.
5
Medical advances not the SCOTUS will do away with Roe vs Wade. But it could be preserved if women stop demanding a double standard. No more pretending a child has only one parent when the issue is to abort. But claiming there is a father (and society,too) with responsiblity when support is needed. Women need to take 100% responsibly legal and financial for their kids. If men (even married men) want partial custoday / visitation they can strike a deal with the mother.
4
I am not understanding why this is still an issue and topic at hand....Roe VS Wade obviously was pushed through to legalize abortions....why is society worried about women who do not want to carry their babies no matter what the reason?? Yet want to cut back on Government assistance and make fathers pay child support for unwanted kids instead of having babies and mistreating them, abusing and neglecting...we have bigger issues in Government that should not be concerned with a law that has already been addressed...
9
He's going to be confirmed. This is just a dog & pony show. The Supreme Court will allow the states to do what they want. So things will go as they have been going. It will be harder. Some states it has gotten pretty difficult and some people have to travel a long way. And there will be less money available for those that need financial help.
It's not just the Supreme Ct., many of the lower courts are being stacked with tighty righties as well. And Senator Useless, I mean Schumer, lord bless him, just made some deal with McConnell to fast track a bunch of confirmations. The Republicans are holding how many pages on Kavanaugh? It doesn't matter now anyway. The Democrats should have done something when Garland's seat was stolen. They only had the Constitution to back them up.
13
Kavanaugh and Roe? Why the rush? Pre-Roe was ghastly for women and their families. Even now, restrictions hurt women who want legal medical care. I worked for abortion rights 40 years ago; yesteyear did not make us great, it only hurt women and their families. What was the point to have lives ruined-- and lost for no reason except punitive people/laws?
Even when abortion became legal it remained beyond difficult, and sometimes shaming to grown, adult women, who were supposed to benefit. Been there, done that---I had one as a married woman years after it became legal, and it was quite devastating---even then, I nearly backed out because the hospital wanted my "husband's signature!!" Can you imagine! I was well over 21, even married, it was legal and the first trimester. It was so over the top disrespectful to me as a grown woman wanting legal medical care that to imagine what would happen going back to illegal times is HORRIFYING!
Now, withholding historic legal documents about a judge is suspect---if he were such a judicious pick, there would be no secrecy. For a lifetime appointment, we need more proof of his truth--full disclosure like everyone else had to show. Mostly we need to wait since this president is under investigation and thus, his picks are totally suspect and can only benefit him, not the public, and for sure not women.
We do not want a return to septic wards, motherless older children, women maimed/dead/or in prison. That would be even more HORRIFYING!!
7
Tremendous piece.
As a basketball coach Kavanaugh seems to love the girls that he coaches. Yet what type of legal protection does he want these girls to have if they fall in love with other girls. Controlling timeouts, plays and substitutions is one thing. Controlling their sexual and reproductive lives is quite another. How ferocious is his need for that. His attempt to force a teenage immigrant young women to give birth was monstrous. Most of these right wing judges seem to have some terrible compulsion to put their grubby controlling hands all over women's bodies. They seem almost to live for that.
15
I keep looking up to see when the section of sky above me will begin to fall. Has not happened yet
3
STOCKPILE mifepristone by the billions of tablets because the redneck antiabortion crowd are determined to criminalize pregnancy termination. Ever man walking needs to have a stash and every woman or adolescent female needs a truckload of tablets reserved for the positive pregnancy test readiness or eventuality. Women with a later term need must have enough $ stuffed in her mattress to get to a skilled medical care service that specializes in the specific gestational timeframe of the unwanted pregnancy. Post 12 week termination requires skilled physicians and equipment. Lastly, considering how crazy America is now, I'd keep a full dose or two of broad spectrum antibiotics hidden in my medicine cabinet if I were to need to induce or have an abortion by whatever means.
5
I hate to say it but if men could get pregnant abortion would not only be legal but covered by a government health plan.
8
TRUMP: The answer is that there has to be some form of punishment.
MATTHEWS: For the woman.
TRUMP: Yeah, there has to be some form.
I think this answers the question. Republicans will always go to the most extreme position. For them The Handmaids Tail is a road map.
27
The right to privacy relied upon in Roe comes from Griswold v Connecticut. Overturning Roe undoes the right to contraception.
7
If you want to see an even bigger political firestorm from the Left than you are seeing now, see what happens if Roe is reversed. Then, I think, the gloves will come off.
5
Ms. Paltrow, can you please explain why in 2018 you are still talking about ‘abortion’ and ‘abortion right’?
Can’t we give all young women in America access to free birth control, so that they don’t ‘get’ pregnant, the way they might ‘get’ the flu?
For goodness sake, people, we are no longer in the 60s!
2018 women should no longer need abortion - a tragic choice for our mothers and grandmothers. We have choices!
And at a time when we can deliver live babies after a 21-week gestation, talking about abortion is truly anachronistic.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.usatoday.com/amp/861386001
7
Thank for your bit of common sense. I sometimes wonder if there is a single democrat in this country who has any sense of responsibility for their own actions or are willing to hold others responsible for their own.
5
@Rosalyn--Let's not forget that some women may need abortions for medical reasons, or if they've been raped and "get" pregnant, as you say. The anti-choice crowd considers these women criminals, as well. My sister needed a medical abortion in her 2nd trimester. It was difficult and heartbreaking for her. But, she had other children to care for and couldn't risk her life. I find it infuriating that male politicians and the fanatics that haunt Planned Parenthood clinics would call her a murderer.
15
It is astonishing to me that the people who are so rabid in their attempts to overturn reproductive rights, and otherwise fight scientific progress, don’t seem to have any idea how much more significant the implications of a sonogram are than merely simulating the superficial aspects of human gestation.
“Everything is vibration.” -Albert Einstein
I remember life before Roe. A married friend of mine with two children discovered that she was two months pregnant and had a 4+ pap test. The state refused to give her a biopsy lest the fetus be aborted, and she had seven months to endure until she carried to term then had a hysterectomy.
Before 1960, sale of birth control devices - even giving birth control information - was illegal in some form in all states.
A sword of Damocles hangs over all women of childbearing age wielded by the Catholic Church and fundamentalist religious sects, who value the life of a woman as less than a fetus. The Catholic church teaches if a woman's life and health is destroyed, it's "God's will." Fundies declare that pregnancy is punishment for sin.
17
Sadly, the right of a woman to make choices about her own health has been labeled, successfully, as either a pro-abortion or anti-abortion issue, leaving rationality behind. Is anyone really "pro-abortion"?
And of course anti-abortionists have labeled themselves as pro-life advocates. Sadly, here, the life of the unborn is deemed more valuable than that of the living, breathing, woman's life or her right to make a choice about what happens to her body.
Labels persuade. Perhaps we should change the "pro-life" "anti-abortion" labels to a "forced birth" stance. Let's just call it what it is. Democrats could take a lesson from Republicans on labeling. And I really, really wish they would.
5
First, there is little evidence that Justice Kavanaugh would overturn Roe. However, even if he did so, that would not make abortions illegal in the US.
What it would do is to return the allowance or restriction of medical procedures back where it belongs, in the lap of the several states. To the best of my knowledge, and I will of course accept provable corrections, no other medical procedure has either a federal prohibition or acceptance. Why should this one be different?
2
Do we need to develop a system of 'Sanctuary Cities and Clinics' that will be willing and committed to women who cannot pay for an abortion somewhere else, if it is not available here at home?
3
I hope all those folks that said there was no difference between Trump and Clinton are happy with the impending loss of a woman's right to choose among all the other awful things Trump has done.,
12
Read Lysistrata-- and Resist!
2
It is a mistake to pretend that the end of Roe v Wade will lead to unsafe back alley abortions and lots of women dying.
Note the following, "Louisiana is on the path to adopting one of the nation's most restrictive anti-abortion laws, as a proposed ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy continues to advance through the Legislature."
Now actually France and Germany and India all strongly discourage abortions after TWELVE weeks. Thus these existing laws are more restrictive than the proposed law in Louisiana.
There is no way that even women in Louisiana will not have options. They just will have to act quickly, as they should.
Incidentally, Kavanagh was confirmed as an appellate Judge in 2006 by a 57-36 vote, He was a nominee of George W. Bush whom the New York Times has now decided to like.
3
Irony.
"Life" after Roe.
That's the point.
2
Before abortion was legal in Indiana, I know of 2 doctors' wives who had abortions: one went to Japan, twice; one flew to NYC where fortunately, abortion was legal. Those w/money will always be able to get abortions -- those w/o are consigned to what used to be called "back-alley" abortions & possible critical outcomes. Why not jail the men who were the cause of the conceptions! Why must women always pay the price!
14
Most women (and girls who have begun to menstruate) can become pregnant.
As such, most women and girls can become pregnant by force.
That should be the minimal baseline reason why abortion should remain legal, safe, and readily available, and settled law.
Why is that fact so difficult for forced-government birth misfits to grasp?
14
For Brett, law is settld when Donny says OK. He is going to be another White Christian Male who willl never be raped or get pregnant, nor will anyone in his family, heavens forbid and so he thinks. Roe is NOT a settled law. It was unsettling previous laws. It all depends upon the political wind and McConnell won it 2015 when his party won majority and he blocked Progressive Obama's choices with his regressive views about his Christianity. Democrats better wake up and make supreme court and the federal courts as the issue that trumps every other progressive idea. Forget, LGBTQ, minimum wage or gender gap.
2
More hysteria from the left. This op-ed is based on an absurd straw man argument, that the nomination is driven by the mythical denizens inhabiting the Handmaidens Tale fantasyland. Kavanaugh has solid judicial credentials and will be confirmed. Period. Those unwilling to engage in safe sex will still have the convenience of abortion. Hooray.
3
Will overturning Roe Vs. Wade by the religious right and other religious groups apply to the oh-so-pious murmuring clergy who make girls pregnant while committing horrendous crimes under cover of secrecy?
How about right-to-life politicians who are covering up affairs even thought they themselves voted against abortion?
Is there ANY study available that indicates how many REPUBLICAN women have had abortions?
DNA testing of the MAN would be a good start....unless you don't know who the father is.
But I bet if you had to show your voter registration card to get an abortion, all this clap trap would stop tomorrow.
Republican Trump voter women would go for this idea in a (fetal) heartbeat!!!!!
After all,to paraphrase Trump... "a lot of people are saying" that only Democrats, people of color or illegals resort to abortion".
Republicans love the IDEA of the sweet widdle bay-bee snug in Mum's womb....all warmy and safe and needing protection.....then....
When the kid pops out....CRICKETS.
Then it's the DEMS responsibility to figure out how to pay for and care for the wailing brat until age 18 if the mother cant or wont.
5
Women of The United States and Men of the United States:
Let's go and circle around the Capitol until we get our vices heard. This is time for stopping the bickering and verbiage and act. That is what the GOP is doing: acting while we are whining.
Brett Kavanaugh is an illegitimate nominee. We need to see those pages hidden from us by so-called Executive Privilege (aka Sultan's Ferman or the Emperor's decree).
NYT please do your historical duty and help us rise the flag. This is what a free press is for.
4
The Wheeler story sounds fishy / made up. Abortion was illegal but the doctor recommended she get one for "medical reasons?" SURE If you believe that I got a bridge to sell.
And if true why did she not go to a state where abortion was legal? If it was such a medical necesity? Even low income people can drive across the country or take a bus. And if the story is true why would Wheeler NOT report who the abortionish is since "the complications" were probably a result of the abortionist doing a blotched job?
3
Today, abortion rights should also be affirmed on the First Amendment right to "freedom of religion" and government restrictions should be stricken as "establishment" violations. In 1790, when the Constitution was ratified, there were no legal restrictions on abortion. The Catholic Church did not have religious penalties either. But in the latter part of the nineteenth century, doctors led states to put restrictions on abortion and the Catholic doctrine started to become more restrictive, Now today, abortion rights, are purely a religious and political issue. Both of which demand freedom to choose by all under our Constitutional democracy.
4
The prison industrial complex needs more free women labor, so getting rid of Roe fits the bill.
7
It's time for young women to take up this fight in droves.
You don't know what it was like before Roe?
Trust me, you don't want to find out.
Vote like your lives are at stake ladies.
Because they are.
11
Maybe the answer is to make life after Roe the era in which women follow the example of Lysistrata, who persuaded the women of Greece to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace and end the Peloponnesian War. It worked. What is the attack on abortion and contraception now ongoing except a war against women? To stop the war, stop the sex. Abortion would again become legal in no time.
5
Most of the damage will be inflicted in Republican states. Red State America will become even more like the Third World. Forced birth of unwanted children brings poverty and other social ills. The people who live in these places, and especially the men who make their laws, should ask themselves: Is punishing women for sex really worth it?
The Republican Party is committing suicide. When they get more power, they unleash devastating harm, especially on those closest to them.
10
The right to an abortion was firmly in place at the time of the founding of this country. It's a common-law right just like the right to exercise your religious beliefs and the right to own a gun for protection of the home. If the Court overrules Roe, then the state and the father should bear all the costs of raising that child, including college and healthcare, and for providing for the mother, including college and healthcare, until the child leaves home. That's more than a fair exchange for taking a right guaranteed by the Constitution away from a person. Then we need to ban the practice all religion and ownership of all guns. If the Constitution doesn't protect all civil rights equally, then all civil rights are subject to complete prohibition.
2
Whatever he says now, Kavanaugh would mark the end of Roe v. Wade.
Kavanaugh very likely lied under oath about his knowledge of Bush's prisoner torture programs during his earlier court confirmation hearings. This is why the GOP is suppressing more than 100,000 relevant documents.
Kavanaugh cannot be trusted. Period!
Unindicted co-conspirator Trump should not be allowed to appoint a Supreme Court Justice that promises to protect him from prosecution. The greatest hypocrites, however, are the White Christian fundamentalists who back Trump no matter how satanic he is.
6
Correction:
Correction --
Women and Men of the United States:
Let's go and circle around the Capitol until we get our voices heard. This is time for stopping the bickering and verbiage and act. That is what the GOP is doing: acting while we are whining.
Brett Kavanaugh is an illegitimate nominee. We need to see those pages hidden from us by so-called Executive Privilege (aka Sultan's Ferman or the Emperor's decree).
NYT please do your historical duty and help us rise the flag. This is what a free press is for.
2
Criminalizing abortion dehumanizes women.
10
The right wing has stigmatized abortion. They stand outside of abortion clinics every day and shame and harass women trying to exercise their constitutional rights. Many of these lunatics gets paid by their churches to do this. If abortion is overturned they might have to get real jobs.
5
The abortion debate has nothing to do with babies, and everything to do with patriarchy. It's all about male supremacy. Kavanaugh must be stopped.
20
Kavanaugh is a sympton. The stakes were always with the elections; Kavanaugh is a result of the voter apathy od the last many decades. You want to preserve choice? Easy, you vote, and not for republicans, duh. Make that double duh.
This is beyond aggravating - there is no chance whatsoever of stopping Kavanaugh. If you didnt realize the stakes in the election - make that, every election - youre either blindly or willfully ignorant.
11
When Trump was elected a major issue of course was the replacement of Scalia. And it was known that Kennedy had to be close to retirement.
Trump and the GOP made strong statements about nominating justices with activist conservative agendas.
Through that white women voters voted in the majority for not just Trump, but for GOP senate candidates.
This guaranteed what we’re getting
Roe v Wade effectively can be overturned while still claiming it was not.
Turning it back to the states and supporting Freedom of Religion to limit insurance coverage and access.
This was a fateful decision against the poor who do not have the means to travel great distances for services
There are two major factions in the so-called women’s movement.
Those (mostly minority) who support change and women’s issues and those (mostly white) who vote little different from white males.
7
Kavanaugh, a conservative, has stated that he recognizes the judicial principle of precedent, or stare decisis as the lawyers call it. Given that Roe v. Wade is a precedent, on what basis might Kavanaugh ignore it? He may ignore it, of course, but why would he?
1
@Mike--Just last year, Kavanaugh ruled against an undocumented teenager in a detention facility who had petitioned for the right to access an abortion. At one point during the hearing, Kavanaugh suggested that allowing the young woman go through with the procedure would make the government “complicit” in something that is morally objectionable. In addition, in 2015, he argued in a dissent that Obama’s contraception mandate infringed on the rights of religious organizations. Those are but two reasons he might use again, depending on the case before him.
52
@Mike.Kavanaugh will overturn Roe v Wade because he BELIEVES! He is a devout Catholic. He believes abortion is a sin. He believes that women do not have a right to control their bodies. He believes that his morality overrides the law. He believes there is no thing in the constitution that protects womens right to chose.
There was a great cartoon of Margaret Atwood, author of Handmaids Tale, saying to RBG "I told you so" https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/america-ruth-bader-ginsburg...
2
@Mike
Is yours a serious question? In the "Janus" decision, Neil Gorsuch, who also expressed great respect for precedent, settled law, and stare decisis, overturned a settled precedent that had governed labor law for about forty years.
Gorsuch is a mercenary who was put on the SCOTUS by certain people to do certain things. He's not a "judge", but a hired gun. Kavanaugh will be the same. If he wouldn't be, he wouldn't have been on the Federalist Society's short list.
10
I agree with Bill Clinton concerning abortion: it should be rare, safe and legal. Beyond that, I am tired of the political circus that has built up around this issue as it has warped our entire political system for decades. There seems to be little to no room for those less than comfortable with abortion among many Democrats and the inverse is true among most Republicans.
It is the issue of abortion more than any other to include race, that has driven evangelicals into the arms of the Republican Party. If you think I am wrong about that you have not been paying attention.
12
There is plenty of room for those less than comfortable with abortion right now in this country. Any woman or teen who is struggling with that decision can find religious, medical, or counseled guidance if they make an effort to seek it out. If you are a man who thinks liberals are cavalier about the sanctity of life perhaps you are the one not paying close attention. Perhaps you might find solace in volunteering to help or support a young woman who wants to bring life into the world. Are you willing to do that?
2
Let’s call a spade a spade: the claim that a fetus is a person, if enshrined in law, is nothing more than the establishment of religion. Some religions do not recognize a life until birth, and the same was a common belief in the US until the criminalization of abortion in the 19th century. And please don’t assume that abortion is a gut wrenching decision. For many of us it isn’t & you don’t have to pity us.
59
Sorry folks, but you should have thought of this 2 years ago. Just remember the Sanders’ supporter mantra: “Hillary and Trump are the same.”
Nobody has done more damage to liberal causes in this country than liberals.
17
Your right Mike this should have been thought about two years ago. The Dems instead of coronating HRC should have provided an even handed approach and we would have had President Sanders
2
@Mike
I completely disagree.
I voted for Sanders in the primary and Clinton in the general.
Liberals did not make all those Republicans vote for Trump.
Liberals did not manipulate evangelicals.
Liberals did not use the NRA.
Liberals did not give us Citizens United.
And Liberals did not give Republicans Fox News and talk radio.
How more than 5% of people could believe Trump is beyond me.
That is not the fault of Liberals.
5
This anti-abortion zealotry is just one facet of Christian fascism from the Republicans. Their broader goal is money, power and CONTROL of people, no matter how it violates our constitutional rights (see the Bill of Rights), but this in particular is about religion and using it to control people's reproductive rights -- in direct violation of the first ten words of the First Amendment.
The Trump administration is withholding information that probably would betray Brett Kavanaugh's extremism. He must be stopped!
35
Back in the 50ties, pregnant girls at my San Diego High School went to Tijuana.
5
Can there be any doubt that america is in its final death throws?
27
Prohibition of alcohol produced the gang wars, prohibition of drugs produced the cartels, prohibition of abortion will produce dead women.
67
Roe is dead. Get your abortions now before it is too late. That was on the ballot. Trump won. He controls the Supreme Court. Elections have consequences. Get over it.
3
@Steve: Your wife and daughters on Long Island will still be able to get abortions if Kavanaugh is confirmed (although they might not tell you when they do so, given your attitude). Blue states like New York won't be affected.
2
The kind of right wing cultural conservatives that crave having a Supreme Court that will reverse Roe v Wade believe that freedom is living in conformance with the moral imperatives of their religions, by all of society. To them allowing people their own versions of freedom of conscience is indifference about people committing sin and condemning their souls to Hell for eternity. They hope to establish a country that is free of institutions that expose they and their children to evil and preventable temptations. For them freedom is freedom from fear of living in sin.
Our liberal democracy with it’s insistence that freedom of religion is freedom of conscious and requires separation of church and state deprives them of the freedom that they seek. They think that government that is not guided by God is against God’s will and invites divine punishment.
Our cultural conservative fellow citizens would save us from ourselves.
7
Trump impeached...we’ll have President Pence.
This man considers all women (except for “mother” his wife) to be harlots, low women looking to seduce him. He wants women back in the home having 11-12 babies as God ordained.
He despises Roe. As gov of Indiana he used TRAP laws to force close most women’s clinics and defunded Planned Parenthood. His biographer said he is the most dangerous man in America b/c “he was sent by God.”
A woman was sentenced to 20 yrs in prison in Indiana while Pence was still governor. “Fetal homicide.” She induced her own labor with pills she bought online from Asia. She aborted the 25 week fetus then placed it in a dumpster. Men won’t understand the terror this woman was going through--must have been horrendous.These men telling her what she needed to do.
She started bleeding heavily and went to an ER.She told them that she had a miscarriage.They removed the placenta and called the police.They found the 25 week fetus; a pathologist said that the “baby” had been alive so she must have killed it.
Complicated, when it shouldn’t have been.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/22/purvi-patel-abortion-sen...
I know her anguish! Before Roe I was 21 yo going to college on scholarship,working nights as a waitress at a hotel restaurant. Met a very famous celebrity, flattered me, gave me a key, slept w him. Got pregnant then suicidal.
I was in Utah! A police sgt found a clinic in NV. I miscarried-normal in 1st 12 wks.
I still cry
22
This move has been coming for 30 years, slowly, inexorably, through Red or Blue presidents, old angry fat white men in power because you don't vote!!
The assault on women continues not with knives and guns but rules and legislation, slowly and carefully, all enabled because YOU DON'T VOTE WHEN YOU CAN!!
EVERY NON-VOTE IS A VOTE FOR THEM, SO PLEASE REGISTER OTHER VOTERS, GET THEM TO THE POLLS, VOTE YOURSELF AS OFTEN AS YOU LEGALLY CAN!!!
Democracy dies in darkness...and so does choice and freedom...
51
Following links from the article, Ms. Paltrow has documented about 1200 unjustifiable pregnancy-related arrests over the last 45 years. That’s 27 per year, with the rates increasing in recent years. A large number of these arrests involve pregnant women using illegal drugs, including meth. These women were charged with the non-existent crime of endangering a fetus. Courts threw out all the cases except for one. The South Carolina Supreme Court reached the alarming conclusion that endangering a fetus was indeed a crime.
Myself, I can’t extrapolate from the evidence to reach the conclusion that there wii be widespread.criminal enforcement of pregnant women if Roe is reversed. I recognizen that others will disagree. My purpose in writing is simply to add to the evidence relevant to the issue raised here.
5
The people who are gung ho on repealing Roe v Wade don't seem to consider the consequences of being unwanted and how that affects one's life. Nor do they appear capable of caring about how it affects society, families or anything else.
I was an unwanted child. My parents were abusive to me. They were not prepared, despite being married and educated, to have a child. It affected how they treated me.
One of my schoolmates parents put her in foster care. They were Catholic and didn't use birth control. She was shifted from home to home for her entire childhood. She was miserable. At one point she laid down in the street hoping a car would run her over.
If you don't an abortion don't have one. But don't tell women seeking abortions for whatever reasons they have (financial, emotional, fetal problems, incest or rape, etc.) that they can't have one. It's not your life at risk or your sanity: it's theirs and they are the only ones capable of making the decision.
I would have preferred not to have been born. Being unwanted is not comfortable or easy. It affects every relationship I've ever entered into. Had I not been born I wouldn't know the difference. But I've seen how people who were wanted feel and act. There's no comparison and therapy cannot undo the damage.
111
It is interesting that there was a nationwide drop in violent crime just about 16 to 20 years after Roe was decided. http://freakonomics.com/2005/05/15/abortion-and-crime-who-should-you-bel...
3
No one has explained to my satisfaction how the law could make abortion illegal but not punish the woman who freely chooses to obtain one for herself. She is a willing "buyer" of the abortionist's service, just like a person who buys illegal drugs from an illegal seller. She may also use various means to perform her abortion without a second person involved. One of the few (only?) times Donald Trump was loudly and forcefully condemned by Republicans for something he said was when he said, as a candidate, that if/when abortion is criminalized, the woman would have to get "some kind of punishment." Anti-abortion activists know that Americans would never accept the arrest, public trial and imprisonment of their daughters and sisters, or their fiancees, wives or mistresses. But what do legal experts say?
6
@abigail49 I'm not a legal expert but my understanding is that the pre-Roe jurisprudence that (usually) punished only the doctor was based on the prevailing legal dogma of that time, i.e., that women were second-class citizens, with fewer legal rights but also less responsibility for their actions. I see no conceivable way of bringing that back, as it would cause chaos throughout the entire legal field. Re-criminalizing abortion in the 21st century would very likely necessitate criminalizing women along with doctors, and the anti-abortion movement intelligentsia surely knows it. As a political naif, Trump correctly perceived this logic -- and was very quickly schooled to keep quiet about it.
2
Abigail just answering your question so please no attacks. Make it illegal for a licensed provider to perform an abortion under criminal and civil penalty. Jail time on the criminal
Side and forfeiture of license with a monetary fine on the civil side. Anyone not licensed would be subject to criminal penalties. Not advocating this but it would not be that difficult Of course a woman can still act on her own but these practices would keep women out of the criminal justice system
"The fight over the next Supreme Court appointment is not just about whether abortion remains legal or illegal...."
NO--it's not!
The fight over the next Supreme Court appointment is about WHETHER WOMEN IN THE UNITED STATES ARE ACTUALLY CITIZENS.
People who cannot even control what happens to their own bodies are NOT citizens. Which is EXACTLY what the republican party wants.
121
I seincerely doubt that you WANT to be clear. The whole idea is to pretend that the end of Roe v Wade will lead to unsafe back alley abortions and lots of women dying. And that will surely rile up your base.
We know perfectly well who is actually dying at the rate of 1700 per day. half of the dead are indeed female but we cannot call them women.
Note the following, "Louisiana is on the path to adopting one of the nation's most restrictive anti-abortion laws, as a proposed ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy continues to advance through the Legislature."
Now actually France and Germany and India all strongly discourage abortions after TWELVE weeks. These existing laws are more restrictive than the proposed law in Louisiana. So there is no way that even women in Louisiana will not have options. They just will have to act quickly, as they should.
5
I had an abortion at 15 weeks. This abortion was for a wanted and planned pregnancy. There are reasons why women need a more than 12 weeks.
8
We have a generation of women who don't know what life was like before Roe. They will be shocked if Kavanaugh is confirmed and the wish of the GOP to overturn Roe is realized.
It's not just abortions, some or maybe all birth control could be outlawed in some states. (Rick Santorum, among others, has been recently quoted as saying, Yes, if Roe is overturned there is nothing that would stop a state from outlawing ALL birth control if the legislature choose to. So 51% of a legislature could decide that birth control was illegal for 100% of the people in that state.)
We think, or used to think, that "that can't happen here in the US." Women won't be arrested for having a miscarriage if the authorities think it wasn't a miscarriage. Women won't have to register their pregnancies with the authorities so they can track if it goes to term.
In the age of Trump, it can happen. A lot of people want things like this to happen.
This is real, people.
76
And Roe will be only one of the measures Kavanaugh will help to usher in. The Trump Evangelicals will now dominate the school systems. You will see forced prayer, only of course of the particular brand that the Evangelicals favor. At the same time they will add to the discrimination against the "unpure" religions. Biology will again teach Creationism. The Koch brothers will have more tax cuts. The media will be sanctioned if it criticizes Trump, the first amendment not-withstanding.
26
To some today, the rights of women are irrelevant as they were to the men who signed the Constitution, Abigail Adams notwithstanding. The concerns expressed in this article are felt profoundly by millions of us. We worry that a conservative dominated court will grant states a license to undercut and diminish women's privacy, access to healthcare, and legal equality. And we're right to worry. Brett Kavanaugh isn't the subject; his nomination matters because it can be a means to a political end that would be bad for American women.
23
We also need to take into account the possible cultural and legal penumbra of the abolition of Roe. Far too many people today talk of the “baby” when they mean the fetus. It may be a poetic license for an expectant mother to imagine the end result of her pregnancy as an actual child (though I never did it, preferring to wait until I saw the newborn). But it is a dangerous philosophical and legal mistake to imagine that a biological process taking place in a woman’s body has independent personhood - let alone has more rights than the woman herself. I have read about pregnant women prevented from getting cancer treatment because it would damage the fetus, even though they were willing to get rid of it before starting chemo. And of course, cases of women arrested for miscarriage or some supposedly dangerous behavior during pregnancy are an outrage. A fetus is not a person. Granting rights to it means taking rights away from women. This is the stark reality of the current cultural and political moment.
97
Assuming Kavannaugh is confirmed and Roe v Wade undone, does that mean the FDA can be compelled to de-approve mifepristone? Can Congress force the FDA to withdraw a drug it has approved based on its standard of efficacy and safety?
11
The issue of criminal sanctions imposed on women after the inevitable overturning of Roe is vital. As Trump stated, when abortion becomes illegal criminal sanctions are unavoidable, and this is a position of rigorous logic. We are told by the pro-life movement that from conception the fertilized egg is a full person. Obviously, if they are full persons then they are innocent. When a woman seeks out an abortion they are terminating that life with premeditation. Thus , if we are to allow the pro-life position to become law then women who seek out an abortion are guilty of pre-meditated homicide. Yes, the "abortionist" will actually perform the abortion, but the woman will always have to conspire for that abortion to take place. Thus, if we are to take the pro-life position seriously, women who procure abortions should be sentenced to life in prison or possibly the death penalty. Yet this is almost never argued. The reason why is clear. The pro-life movement does not really believe that a first trimester fetus is a full person. They search for a view that expresses what they see as the wrongness of abortion without going this far. But if they argue that the wrongness of abortion consists in the loss of human life then this would imply the prohibition not only of the morning after pill, but of all artificial birth control. It might be noted that in Conn. the use of birth control by married persons was illegal until the 1960s. End Roe & then the trouble really begins.
48
The question isn't just Roe v Wade - the real battleground is the "right to privacy" which underpins it. The "right to privacy" was established as an implied constitutional right in 1965 in Griswold vs Connecticut (which ruled against state's ability to limit access to contraception). An 'originalist' Supreme Court with Kavanaugh could well argue that privacy isn't specified in the Constitution, no such right exists, and both Roe and Griswold could fall.
32
As a man I've been spared the pressure of ever having to make the decision about whether or not to have an abortion. As a human being I find the idea of abortion as a representation of failure - failure to have the means or the ends to prevent an unwanted pregnancy. But having some awareness of what women have gone through to reach this gut-wrenching decision in the past, even knowing that it could mean their death, is enough to convince me that this must be left to women to decide in their own best interest.
Canada previously treated women and doctors who performed abortions as criminals as well. After the brave actions of Dr. Henry Morgentaler abortion laws were struck down and women and their doctors decide on the best course of action for themselves. The number of abortions have been declining.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Canada
52
Article 1 of the Constitution describes a legislative process far better suited to deal with this issue than are the courts. After Roe (unlikely to come to pass) and before a federal law was enacted the overwhelming majority of states would still protect legal abortion in the first 2 trimesters despite scare tactics from people who wish to sink this nominee at any cost.
6
Try living in the middle of Texas after Roe is overturned. Those women will need to drive through 2-3 states (11 plus hours each way) and possibly multiple times to have a legal abortion. Access will be a huge barrier for a large swath of the country. The latest most rural areas, where unintended pregnancies are statistically higher.
5
@btb
What in the world makes you think the "overwhelming majority" of states would pass laws to keep abortion legal in the first 2 trimesters? Not only would they not do that, just wait until they start working to outlaw female contraception.
7
Comparing life without Roe in the 60's with a theoretical life without Roe in 2018 seems pointless to me. The world has changed in countless ways, some for the good, some for the bad. More important, the Supreme Court can't outlaw abortion. If it overturns Roe, it throws the issue back to the states, a place it should never have left.
10
Not pointless. The abortion restrictions added in many states after Roe show what can happen even under the protection of Roe. The pills that can terminate unwanted pregnancies came after Roe. If the Supreme Court makes abortion illegal, do you not think that many states would move to criminalize the purchase of those drugs? Of course, women would still order them but probably through more and more devious channels to avoid prosecution. Kind of like the back-alley, Mexico, and coat-hanger abortions isn’t it? The convenience of a pill could be easily over-shadowed by stiffer criminal penalties.
26
If the US Supreme Court reverses Row v Wade it doesn’t go back to the States. It becomes The Law of the Land.”
2
@Rob Berger
Unless you are prepared to turn your most intimate and significant health decisions over to the state legislatures, you have no business telling women our concerns are irrelevant. I can remember sitting in legislative hearing in Massachusetts in the early 70s, when changing the laws were subject to debate. I listened as women were denigrated, insulted and diminished by male legislators, eager to showcase their anti-abortion bona fides. I'm old now and unfortunately no longer convinced that the world has changed as much as many think. Glib dismissals like this one illustrate why we need more women in public office. Pro-choice or anti-abortion, at least the women are more likely to understand the stakes.
7
Perhaps more is at stake than Roe. The SC has already taken a stand against certain types of birth control in the Hobby Lobby decision. When will other types of birth control be less available d/t legal rulings about employer-based healthcare coverage or for other perverse reasons? Planned Parenthood prevents many more abortions than it facilitates by providing birth control access to those with few resources, but it is under such extreme attacks that it may not survive. Birth control prevents abortion, but all pro-life groups are against birth control. The latter illuminates what is really going on. Allowing religion to determine healthcare choices is theocracy, and is a violation of the 1st Amendment if "prohibiting the free exercise therof" isn't interpreted as imposing one's religious beliefs upon others.
111
This is a very important point related to overturning Roe: if it is overturned every woman of childbearing age is automatically suspected of committing a crime at all times. If a woman is pregnant one day and not pregnant the next, regardless of the circumstances, she must be able to explain how the pregnancy terminated “naturally.” If the government makes abortion a crime it must treat all terminated pregnancies as potential abortions, and the women as guilty until proven innocent.
87
@M If I read your comment correctly, you shine light on the broader ramifications of an overturning of Roe. Progressivism is dying a slow death and with it conservative intellectual integrity. What is going on? Is it so obvious that money has taken control of everything?
2
A blastocyt is not a human being, it is a clump of undifferentiated
tissue. No old white man sitting behind a bench is going to tell me that I must be forced to give birth, particularly after rape.
If men were able to get pregnant there would be abortion on demand.
They can pass all the laws they want: women will still have abortions although they may die in the process.
This is what the " pro-lfe" party advocates. Not the life of a woman, just the life of a zygote.
Particularly as Republicans chip away at health care and social services for families.
163
An articulate and succinct exposition on the nightmare that is “life” under the republican dictatorship.
3
@Carla, shouting at the rain from the relative safety from prolife demagogues in Brooklyn is fine, but women in MO or MS face a very different reality, especially the poor ones.
If Roe is overturned, poor women and isolated red states will stain their land with the blood of back wood abortions.
32
Have no illusions, like the lamentable Scalia, a scourge on women, like Alito, like Thomas, like Roberts, especially like Gorsuch, Kavanaugh's first loyalty is not to the Constitution, not to the law but to his church's theology and dictates and male autocracy.
How do we know that? He lives his life that way, why would anyone expect him to decide any other way? Et tu Sen. Collins.
His is a very catholic way and view of life and he is ready to impose it on every fertile female in the United States.
If he tells any senator otherwise, and he has, he is lying, lying, lying.
He lied to you Sen. Collins, just like McConnell did.
Regrettably then, much of the fate of women in this country depends on the most gullible woman in the nation - Sen. Susan Collins.
147
@Carl Zeitz
Susan Collins is completely useless, a hypocrite.
14
@Carl Zeitz. she's not gullible, she thinks her constituents are stupid. Several of them are my family members, and they're not. Her time will come.
3
@Carl Zeitz, shoot, just like Roberts did. He and the other right wingnuts on the SC have been legislating from the bench for a decade or more. Heck, they even decided an election directly in 2000 and indirectly in 2014 by effectively gutting the civil rights act.
6
You have to pretty gullible to take this Shirley Wheeler story at face value. Her lawyer said she was the only one ever prosecuted in the US for an abortion,and that’s probably still true. What really happened is that the hospital referred her to the DA so she could report the abortionist who cut her. But she refused to give up his/her name. It appears that some idiot DA threatened to prosecute her if she didn’t cooperate, and you can figure out the rest. As for the harsh conditions of probation, they weren’t set by the judge. They were mentioned by the probation officer, who had no authority to impose them.
6
It's not right-to-lifers on top--the Kavanaughs and the Sessions and the Trumps.
It's the willing tools--sheriffs, prosecutors, hospital workers--underneath
9
I will never understand why so many American women vote for men who think so little of them. Wake up.
253
Yes, by all means - put Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court.
I would love to see 160 million women radicalized.
Nothing will prove to this country that Republicans, righties and religionists are totally out of sync with modern-day values more than 160 million women descending onto that one building that houses the nine Supreme Court Justices.
This isn't the 1st century or the 10th century.
Nor is it the 50's.
Reliable birth control has been around for decades.
Safe abortions have been around for as long.
The Male Pill is only 5-10 years away.
Everything has changed.
Religions are no longer the end-all of "values".
Not when clerics rape children and the Church refuses to follow the laws of turning in perps and this gov lets them.
I haven't a drop of respect for Kavanaugh because he is supposedly "religious".
Big deal. I've heard that from thousands in my ancient age.
Like trump, many of the cloth bald-face lie.
Kav isn't too upset about kidnapping children and making them "Forever Prisoners" in Walmarts, is he?
Ethical?
I'm not buying it.
Go ahead, make my day: Put him on the SC.
Who cares?
The SC holds only a dim 20% approval rate.
We will have no problem ignoring the whole bunch of them.
Even our dear RBG. Frankly, I'm sick of her "normalizing " these women haters.
What will happen will be on-line support for chemical abortions.
It's not the 50's anymore.
Women today are not Doris Day or Audrey Hepburn.
No girdles.
No nylons.
No white gloves.
Those days are gone.
63
@rosa
Thank you, you've really cheered me up! You're right.
2
@rosa of 160 million women how many of them can't figure out birth control? It's not rocket science.
1
With or without Roe, abortions will happen. But, they will be performed in different locations. For those with little, they will go back to where they were performed, in back rooms and basements. That is when maternal deaths will rise. In many, if not all states, they will be the leading cause of maternal deaths. The event the author sites is typical. In Richmond, one abortionist was paid $300 to shove filthy popsicle sticks into the uterine cavity, telling the women they would abort after the uterus became infected. It worked but women began to come to ERs with septicemia. One abortionist used a close hanger but the tip ended up perforating the uterus and then puncturing her lung. This is what was there before Roe and this is what will happen after Roe if it is overturned. One young doctor told me that the doctors who were most opposed to overturning Roe, were the older docs. They had been there before Roe. But while we are focusing on Roe, there has been a chip by chip reduction of facilities. The demands on where they are being performed have reduced them significantly. Informed consent forms have to include things not related to the women's safety. But Roe symbolizes something else, the right to privacy. That right must be fought for or the chipping away process will begin. Privacy will be endangered if Roe is overturned
17
@Ron The lungs are no where near the uterus.
1
I think it was Christopher Hitchens who said religion poisons everything. Overturning Roe would be a good example.
42
There must be someone, on the left, who can read and understand a simple declarative sentence.
So, please have that person read Roe and explain it to the rest.
Roe, was about privacy, not abortion. And, it focused on specific laws in the state of Texas.
4
@Objectivist It set a precedent, and other decisions were built on it. It is shorthand for the whole edifice because when you remove the basement it all comes down.
8
There is an under-current of glee, just beneath the surface, there are many men that our waiting eagerly to punish women. You know, and they know, that it is always to women's fault. We do remember Litlith.
Even Ireland and Argentina have learned something about women and abortion. The United States is going backwards in too many ways.
103
@Carol I don't think it's mostly about "punishing women." Largely, for the social engineers, it's about sex. The idea is that if birth control (including abortion) is more difficult then people will be more careful with sex, and, with hedonism not available, they'll return to an imagined old way of life (that never existed, for there has always been debauchery and traditional family life wasn't as rosy as painted, for anybody). Not that that would actually happen at this point. But for many rank and file partisans it really is about the notion that abortion is sacrificing babies to Satan. But indeed, it's also about increasing family sizes, and that means turning women into tools to do it. Where women are free, population growth slows. And again, the conservative plan is aiming at a target that has moved. Making hordes of dumb oppressed peasants is pointless these days. You just need a few.
1
Life after Roe will be like life before Roe. I remember it well. Back alleys and kitchen tables. Uptown in spanish Harlem, if you lived in the city. Puerto Rico if you could afford it. Mexico if you lived in California. Crooked doctors and midwives, who you hoped knew what they were doing. D&Cs by a proper doctor if you had the funds. I've aged out of that particular predicament. But if a woman needs an abortion, she will find one. Legal when available, illegal when not.
451
@AMM "Life after Roe will be like life before Roe" No, it wwon't be. That is little more than a scare tactic.
For one thing, oral contraceptives did not exist in these days. Nor did RU-486. No state will be able to ban these. So the need for abortion will be much less and many people will be able to simply travel to another state.
True, there will be some gaps. But things will hardly be like what existed before Roe v Wade.
Please do not resort to scare tactics.
5
@AMM Medical abortions will diminish the need for back alley abortions. It is difficult to believe that this country in the 21st Century has sunk to the lowest common denominator of medieval patriarchal religion. Donate heavily to Planned Parenthood!!!!
2
If Roe is overruled the question of legal abortion will be up to each individual state. New York legalized abortion in 1970. What will happen is that women will be able to obtain safe legal abortions in blue states and not in red states. It is time for supporters of reproductive freedom to hold their legislators accountable for keeping it safe and legal.
3
If SCOTUS does overturn Roe, not all women will suffer equally. Those who are affluent will continue to have access to abortions, here or abroad. Since Planned Parenthood is under attack, poor women will confront unwanted pregnancies they otherwise could have avoided. They will face the tragic choices of having a child they cannot afford to support or risking their lives through an unsafe abortion.
One cannot accuse the Republican of inconsistency. Their laws generally hurt the working class.
70
Where our next selection of a Justice and the election goes is going to be very telling. I don,t think the Russpublicans are concerned about Roe, their plan is the path of least resistance, SCOTUS will empower the states to enact the heart beat laws everywhere. This gives the SCOTUS cover and the Fire and Briestone Bridgade can raise the banner and march on the states, an end run on the Roe issue. A plus in the House would give the Democrats the ability to throw up some road blocks but once the SCOTUS has a sold 5 it will mean a green light for the states on many issues, States controlled by Russpublicans, now, so vote.
2
There is nothing in either the Old or New Testaments that prohibits abortion. The only mention of it is in Exodus 21:22-25. It says that when a man injures a pregnant woman (not his wife) and causes her to miscarry, he owes damages to the husband for the loss of property (i.e., the fetus). In other words, both wife and children, born or unborn, are property of the husband. The woman's well-being isn't taken into account.
Subsequent Jewish law allows for abortion up to the time when the child can survive outside the womb. When there is a choice to be made, the health and welfare of the mother are always given precedence over those of the fetus.
IMO, the only real connection the anti-abortion crowd has with the religion they so often spout is that they want to return to a time when both women and babies were men's property.
129
We can't take Brett Kavanaugh's word, at face value, that he sees Roe v. Wade as settled law. He knows full well that the right to a safe, legal abortion is being chipped away at both local and the highest levels. We know it, too, just like we know that Republican lawmakers are rooting for Judges like him to 'legislate from the bench.' We know what this will mean for American women. And we must not let our rights to make the most personal decisions for ourselves, in good medical care and with dignity, be taken away.
290
@NM: And yet those same "conservatives" whine and complain about "Liberals legislating from the bench." The GOP hypocrisy machine knows no bounds.
44
@NM
He lies, just like John (Balls and Strikes) Roberts, as proven by the long reach of the Citizens-United, "Money is speech" decision that made our Congress even more for sale.
6
@NM The Supreme Court has the power to reverse "settled law". See Brown v Bd of Education.
2
I grew up in the Bible Belt before Roe, when being an unwed mother was socially devastating, and the religious, moral people insisted that the father step up and marry the mother.
One thing that strikes me about the current discussion on ending legal abortion is the TOTAL silence on the issue of men's role in creating a pregnancy. You would think the religious "pro life" people believed Immaculate Conception still happens today!
Thought experiment for a post-Roe society:
With today's DNA technology, we can easily determine the paternity of a child. I suggest that, if the mother is to be required to carry the pregnancy to term, the biological father should be required to support the resulting child (at least 1/2 of the financial responsibility) at least for the two decades it takes to raise the child.
Just as the government polices abortion, the government could police financial support by the father--garnished wages, or if that doesn't work, imprisonment with forced labor.
If the child has a birth defect that requires the child to have custodial care but an abortion was not allowed, the father would be responsible for the custodial care at least 12 hours/ day throughout the life of the child.
It DOES take TWO to conceive a child. Why is ALL the discussion about what a woman is or is not allowed to do with her body?
I have a feeling that the discussion would change dramatically if the man who impregnated the woman were also required to share in the consequences.
947
@SusannaMac
Please note that I am not actually advocating for this, just presenting it as an illuminating thought experiment--that if we ever get to a post-Roe reality, the biological father be required to participate in the consequences of the pregnancy brought to term.
86
@SusannaMac . Good thought. Consider another side. Many men are, sadly, absentee parents in the existing environment, and some, (who knows what percentage), were overridden on the issue of ending the pregnancy early. Should a man have the option of declaring, say, before a judge that he wishes to opt out, pay 1/2 the cost of an abortion and walk away with no further rights or obligations?
11
@SusannaMac the existing child support laws do permit the custodial parent (or in circumstances where a child receives government assistance, the state) to pursue child support from the noncustodial parent. The financial support of an existing child does not address the fact that a woman’s body is her own, and the government should not be permitted to compel a woman to involuntarily bear an unwanted pregnancy which creates numerous risks to her health.
20
abortion rights have been slowly eroding under republican pressure since the election of reagan. in many states its so difficult to get an abortion it might as well be illegal. so when the supreme court finally over turns it most of the damage will have already been done. what supporters of choice need to do is create a network of states where it remains legal and relatively accessible and through crowd funding create a means of providing abortions to women who want them but live in states where it is illegal. those of us who believe in a women's right to chose should be willing to put our money where are principals are and create a fund that will provide transportation, lodging and pay for the abortion itself.
262
@allen
I have been supporting abortions not otherwise funded for years through charities making funds available to poor women who can not otherwise fund them, so I have no a priori objection to your suggestion.
But the fact remains that abortion is health care for women as carrying a pregnancy to term is always more dangerous these days than an abortion. (150 years ago abortions were far more dangerous so this was not always the case. Of course graveyards clearly show how dangerous child birth was, so even then there were circumstances where abortion was safer. Originally abortions were restricted to protect women because abortions were often so dangerous.)
I'll accept this deal. I'll contribute to the charities funding abortions if the anti-aboritonists have to pay for all the births and childraising of all unwanted children, that includes school through college, and support of gravely disabled children as well as healthy ones.
Like the suggestion that the fathers have to pay 1/2 the lifelong care of the children forced into the world, we know this does not have a snowball's chance of passing.
There was never a time without abortion. Just a time without safe legal abortion. I'm from that time and I was lucky enough never to need an abortion either before Roe v Wade was decided when I was a junior in college -- I remember the day distinctly -- or after until pregnancy became an impossibility for me. How tragic we may have to start from scratch again.
154
@allen There are hundreds of such funds already in operation. The National Network of Abortion Funds is a good place to start if you’re looking to donate.
2
The problem with that approach is that is lessens or eliminates political pressure on the backward states to reform their laws. The legislators can continue to be hypocrites by banning abortion but looking the away way as their citizens go to other states for safe abortions. No, instead, they should be forced the face the consequences of their actions.
2
Banning abortion will work just as well as banning firearms (or types of firearms). It won’t.
5
The anti-abortion and religious zealots will be jumping up and down with joy if Roe is overturned. Once they accomplish that, they'll be in the hunt for those women who have one illegally.
Then they'll demand prison time for those that do. The Supreme Court will have to go along, so they'll rule abortions are a felony.
But it won't end there, next these zealots will demand a harsher sentence, felony murder. And the Supreme Court will.....
15
Kavanaugh is a shoo-in and he will rubber stamp whatever the far right wants. This article is too late. Now what?
15
I don’t get the faux outrage of this piece. It seems perfectly reasonable that premeditated murder of innocents should be punished by appropriate sanction by the state. But then I not only oppose legal abortion, but the death penalty and war as well. They are all evil acts inconsistent with the ethics of valuing human life.
5
@Nathan Friend I am guessing that if you were a young woman who'd been raped at gunpoint or if you were a victim of incest, you'd likely feel differently about this issue. Easy to look at it from the outside and make a judgement like yours. It's not a decision you will ever have to make about your own body and your ability to deal with a pregnancy, physically and emotionally.
13
Extreme arguments, such as this one, continue to dominate, while reasonable, thoughtful differences on tough issues are ignored. A clear majority of Americans want abortion to be legal in many circumstances. A clear majority also want restrictions on the right to abortion, such as banning killing fetuses/babies after a certain degree of development, saving those who survive abortions, etc. Planned Parenthood and it’s allies are abortion extremists, opposing very reasonable restrictions on late-term abortions which are common in Europe. These extremists also oppose requiring medical attention to save babies/fetuses that survive abortions. Like the NRA on guns, abortion extremists resist any common sense restriction on this one right. Those seeking to simply ban abortion are on the other extreme. Most Americans reject both extremes, but the advocates and the media seldom address this. Better to paint reasonable differences as fascists vs. baby killers. How did we get such polarization?
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@Kevin Johnson, it's quite probably we've reached such polarizations by believing entirely made up "facts" about the people we're opposing.
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@Kevin Johnson The one argument that the conservatives make that I have some respect for is the argument against abortion. In general, I think the anti-abortion folks as Kevin Johnson says are far, far extreme in their views, but the basic question of morality still exists. Kevin, where you are absolutely wrong is that it is not the media that fail to "address" the issues, it is the politicians. And yes, while politicians on both sides of this issue may invoke the extremes it is the Republican party that does not represent the views of the public at large. On abortion, on the environment, no guns, on all these issues, the GOP politicians happily take the most extreme positions possible. They are even quoted these days for knowingly catering to the extreme, but yet Red states vote these men and women into office.
@Kevin Johnson
This article overlooks the obvious: that if the Supreme Court overrides Roe, most states will simply write Roe into their state laws. The difference is that instead of a blanket declaration that "abortion is legal", they will probably have to offer compromises about when it is permissable.
California allowed "health reasons" for abortions in the 1960s. Recent articles on pre-Roe cases usually interpret this as "abortion was legal in California".
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Isn't interesting how the Republican mantra of "get government out of our lives" is only applied in the case of tax cuts and deregulation?
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@Aaron Leo: Republicans--government so small it can fit in your uterus.
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@Aaron Leo I recently read something that summed it up perfectly. "They want to make government so small that it will fit inside a uterus."
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My Child, My Right
Both progressive and conservative Justices on the Supreme Court are limited by the facts and parties that come before the court.
The real apprehension in the legal community relates to the unknown thoughts of how a court might decide a case involving rights of a father to protect his unborn child. Abortion practice currently assumes the consent of the father or at least an exclusive relationship between a woman and her abortionist that the father may not invade by the father.
The evolving law of surrogate parenting recognizes contract rights against a woman that simply agrees to gestate the child. Without a written contract, a woman’s consent to carry a fetus can certainly be inferred from sexual intercourse without contraception. Putting aside any potential criminal penalties, the politically explosive legal issue involves the potential a father to recover civil damages against an abortionist that destroys his unborn child without consent. As a practical matter, there is little public policy need to consider a law that might provide for criminal penalty or civil recovery directly against the woman if recovery is available against the abortionist.
Those who think men have, or should have, no rights before the birth of their child, are mistaken. Those on the extreme political left are also walking on eggshells because most men want to procreate sooner or later. Not using a condom is a dead giveaway. Suing an abortionist is the next best thing.
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This is an argument properly taken to elected state and federal representatives for consideration in proposed abortion legislation. It bears not at all in the question whether the constitution guarantees a right to abortion, which is a matter of legal interpretation.
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I became pregnant as a teenager, back in 1965. Following an illegal abortion, I bled heavily for days. I was terrified, but knew I absolutely must not seek medical help, as abortion was illegal. I risked quietly bleeding to death, but saw no alternative.
I did telephone a kindly physician who had sympathized but refused to perform an abortion two weeks earlier. He declined to give me any advice about the bleeding, and did his best to avoid any reference to pregnancy, hinting that he feared his phone was tapped.
This level of fear over an ordinary medical procedure will be the norm once again, if the pregnancy enforcers have their way. They seem to believe that--at least for females--sexual intercourse always merits punishment.
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It seems fashionable to claim that reversing Roe will cause the sky to fall. But half of America lives in blue states, where abortion will surely remain legal. A sizable percentage in red states live reasonably close to a blue state abortion clinic. Medical abortions -- not available before Roe -- are generally safe and will become more common. As for prosecution of women who have had abortions, as I explain elsewhere, the story of Shirley Weaver is an urban myth.
I hate to break the bad news to you, but the reversal of Roe will not lead to widespread imprisonment of women and, as for the vast majority, abortions will continue to be safe. That's the way it was in Ireland. And it will be even better here.
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@michjas
So women, especially the poorer with little emotional support, should be treated differently than those in a blue state? Before Roe I had friends who suffered backstreet abortions. It was not pretty. May those days NEVER return.
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@michjas
I think of Savita Halappavanar’s life and death in Ireland, and reject your blithe assurances that a post-Roe America will be good for women. Ireland is moving out of the dark ages.
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My mother had several miscarriages in hopes to have another child. When knowing that another pregnancy would likely fail, the other side of the argument is that it would be murderous to attempt to produce another fetus that will certainly have the same fate.
Let doctors and patients decide the best for all and keep politicians, mostly men who do not bear the medical consequences of pregnancy, out of these difficult decisions.
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It is unbelievable to me that the superstitious myths of Iron Age Mesopotamian shepherds are still guiding our legal process in the 21st Century. But there it is.
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@goofnoff
Especially considering the fact that it was a dream.
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@goofnoff
I will differ with you. In old Rabbinic commentary there is no blanket prohibition re abortion. It was an issue that was deeply pondered and mostly decided in favor of the mother's well being.
This movement is largely an artifact of the Christians; and part of the resistance to humanistic thought. First, the Catholics who were chauvinistically opposed to female sexuality and wanting to enlarge the flock. Then no-fun fundamental christians with their rigid mindset.
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Actually the Talmudic rabbis held that a fetus isn't considered a person until it emerges from the womb and takes its first breath. While this would have been written down and codified several hundred years after Jesus walked the Earth, he would have been familiar with their arguments from the rabbis of his era when the Mishna was being compiled. (Disclaimer: I'm not religious in the slightest, I think it's all different fairytales about invisible sky gods.)
Of course the prevailing attitudes would have been markedly different when life was, in the words of Hobbes, "nasty, brutish, and short." This is why the population of the world remained relatively stable for millennia despite women constantly giving birth in the time before birth control, abortion, antibiotics, understanding of asepsis, and modern anesthesia.
On a planet of 7 plus billion, those archaic attitudes must change. Goes against the Bible's precept to be responsible stewards of the planet.
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I see it this way. If Roe is overturned, the federal government will no longer dictate abortion rights. In the absence of federal law, state law will govern. All blue states will protect abortion rights. If all red states outlaw abortion, women in those states will surely rely heavily on medication abortions. Also, a great majority of women in these states are within a bus ride of several hours from a blue state abortion clinic. The most isolated red states are Alaska and the states of the deep South. The urban centers of these states may well pass local laws authorizing abortion. In the end, it is the women of the isolated red states who will be most vulnerable. And it is worth noting that the majority in most of these states oppose abortion. So the red states will restrict themselves and nobody else.
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@michjas - Women in red states could cease voting for Republicans. I wonder whether the future of Roe v. Wade was even on the radar of the 52% of white women who voted for Trump.
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The idea is to prosecute the person performing the abortion, not receiving it. Shirley Wheeler's example is consistent with this. She was not prosecuted for getting an abortion but for hiding the identity of the person who did commit the crime. And for all we know she did perform the abortion. Prosecuting a woman who got an abortions is not the same thing a prosecuting a woman for getting an abortion. Also the State Supreme Court overturned her conviction, which seems a convenient detail to leave out. Do you have an other examples for stating that "the story" pro-lifers tell you "is not true", because this ones is anecdotal, at best.
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@Caleb Ely True. But I do want to take this opportunity to say that, though I am pro-choice, I find it appalling that those who oppose abortion rights target only the provider, or purport to, as though the woman seeking the abortion is somehow not responsible. How does that make any sense?
My guess is that this is a political strategy, rather than a principled position. Jailing a few doctors might be much more acceptable than jailing many, many more of their patients, particularly if those patients are our mothers, sisters, daughters, wives, or girlfriends.
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This account is totally true. I read it onlne in the Orlando. Sentinel.
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@Caleb Ely "Ms. Wheeler, whose conviction was later overturned, ..."
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“Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.”
—- Barry Goldwater
The old, crusty, white, ‘religious’ Grand Old Perverts just can’t live without controlling womens’ body parts.
November 6 2018
Vote out the Mad Misogynists.
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@Socrates Thanks for that Goldwater quotation. I never thought I'd agree with anything Goldwater said, but I don't remember ever hearing that particular statement.
I hope Trump will not be impeached because I find the prospect of Pence taking over the end of Trump's term - and then possibly being elected for four (or eight) more years - even more frightening than a continued Trump presidency. For the very reasons Goldwater mentioned in that statement.
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@Socrates
I am strongly in favor of abortion rights. But I am strongly against nonsense arguments. A fetus is neither a person, as pro-life fanatics insist, or a body part, as you insist. Responding to pro-life fanatics with your own fanaticism is extremely unhelpful.
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@michjas
A fetus is not a woman's body part, correct. But a uterus, the key woman's body part in involved in both conception and abortion certainly is. Even pro-life fanatics understand this basic anatomic fact.
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I really don’t get it.The fierce abortion opponents insist that the fetus is a person from conception.Surely these people want this “person” to have two parents- to know the father as well as the mother.This can be accomplished with DNA tests which have been perfected.This way the father of the new person can take the same responsibility as the mother.I have no idea why lawmakers seem to think babies only have one parent.
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@Janet Michael As my mother told me when I was young "the girl is always the goat."
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@Janet Michael
It's because the abortion opponents are so religious that they believe in Immaculate Conception--God is responsible for the pregnancy, including in the case of rape, and it conveniently has nothing to do with a human male!
Trouble is, once the Christ-Child is born, they are still sleazily sanctimonious, but somehow have no problem shredding the social safety net. They do not want to help provide food, clothing, health care, education without a school-to-prison pipeline, etc. See Matthew 25:34-46.
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@Janet Michael
I’m pretty sure it’s because the vast majority of lawmakers are white men. Mostly older white men.
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The super rich will always find a way out. But the rest of the women won't be able to escape the restrictions that will continue to impact a woman's right to choose.
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@A Before Roe v Wade, there was a whole "industry" in Mexico along the US border of "clinics" providing abortions. These will likely open up again.
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Funny how these people want to cut health care for babies, mothers, and families once the child is born.
An unborn baby is free, from ideological or financial constraints, so they can yell all they like.
A real baby and a real mother are people. Fhese Republicans and "Christians" (see the Gospels, they are decidedly *not* Christian and would put Jesus in Gitmo or some such) are not pro-life. They don't like real living people with real living problems. They, like Paul Ryan, made their way with the health of the government they want to drown in a bathtub. They have their Cadillac health plans and their outsized profits.
Who care about people? Democrats that's who.
They really don't care. Do U?
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@Susan
Aye, I do. I care about the babies, and the children, the mothers, the fathers, and even republicans.
A true Liberal cares about the welfare of all, however religious conviction does not usurp any one person's basic human rights. (especially those of women)
A woman has sole dominion over her own body, that cannot be legislated away. It can only be hindered by puritanical laws which sole design is to keep women as second class citizens.
If this radical judge is put on the bench, then the next move by Democrats is to expand the bench and appoint multiple judges that will counterbalance such radical notions. Play their game.
Just a thought.
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@FunkyIrishman. Don’t think it will work. The courts are getting stacked against such ideas that are “progressive,” “libertarian,” or what most people would consider the norm. What will happen next? Are 21st century people going to live under ancient rule? If Americans do not change our current direction, we will be losing a lot more than just our freedom of choice. It’ll be the beginning of government ruling our private lives.
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I wish Democrats cared as much as you say they do. I live in a blue town in a blue state. Women at the local abortion clinic are harassed by anti-abortion protesters right at the door. It's the "civil right" of religious people to harass these women, who already have to make a painful choice, and deserve peace and privacy. Other women in town are breeding like rabbits, as we are gentrified by rich overbreeding couples. I feel like I'm already living in the Handmaid's Tale. And these Democratic states and towns are increasingly have/have not places, which underlines not only the access, but the desperation women feel, and how differently rich and poor women are treated. All I can say is, I am so glad I went through early menopause, and thankful that I never got pregnant, but I have to pay very high taxes to support everyone else who does.
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I am a Republican who always strongly supported Roe largely because I reject as barbaric the enslavement of women to a biological identity. I also remember what America looked like with regard to abortion in 1973, when Roe was decided by the Supreme Court: back-alley abortions that could result in death of the woman, a very different definition of “American” depending on the state you happened to live in, and a religious war about to be fought on our soil. However, I’ve also lived through waves of technological innovation that are fast making the issue of abortion moot as regards what the Court has to say about it.
The increasing popularity and availability of self-administered “abortion pills” will make surgical and other invasive methods that require at least legal tolerance … obsolete; and soon – at least for abortions occurring before late-second-trimester terms, when even under Roe states have legitimate power to regulate the permissibility of abortions. While women likely will want to “self-administer” under the eye of a physician, observation to treat possible complications is not the same as performing an invasive surgical abortion.
This is going to happen regardless of what Bret Kavanaugh believes or does. Life after Roe will continue, and probably far more conveniently for women than under Roe.
Bret Kavanaugh as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court will not possess the power to roll back history to a fraught and perilous 1973.
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@JP
I'm not a lawyer and not a cop. So, I can afford to look at our "War on Drugs" objectively as the dismal failure it always was. If there is demand for abortion pills, there will be supply and there will be use to the limit of the demand, quite regardless of what states, police authorities and courts have to say about it. Eventually, as with pot, universal contempt for unenforceable laws will cause even the laws to be repealed.
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Actually, there are sadly a number of states that also make abortion by medication nearly impossible. They impose restrictions such as only allowing a women to use the drug under the supervision of a doctor, and then place an obscene amount of restrictions on what doctors are qualified to prescribe and supervise the administration of said medication. It’s in the same vein as only allowing abortions to be performed by a doctor with admitting privileges at a local hospital, but the local hospital is a religious institution that will not grant privileges to an abortionist, forcing them to limit their practice to areas where there are secular hospitals, which usually geographically limits access. It’s a de facto ban on abortion.
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@Richard Luettgen
Did you read the part about some states making self-abortion a felony? About where women were prosecuted for taking drugs to cause an abortion?
Women are already being prosecuted for miscarriages. The reversal of Roe v Wade will just bring about the next step in the demonization of women who choose abortion. The "pro-lifers' will next target any women who becomes pregnant and doesn't have a live birth.
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