It’s quite a controversy
Per Jeffrey St. Clair, consider: In the 48 years since Roe v. Wade was decided, the Democrats have had ample opportunity to codify (via legislation) the right to an abortion. In that time, they’ve controlled the Senate for 29 years, the House for 29 years and the presidency for 21 years. Instead, many Dems voted for the Hyde Amendment which sought to restrict abortion rights, especially for poor women. The Hyde Amendment prohibited federal funds for abortions. It was first enacted in 1977, only four years after Roe. One of its most enthusiastic co-sponsors: Joe Biden.
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Doesn’t this seem simple: It’s not a good idea to force someone to have an unwanted baby.
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Clearly it’s not that simple. Rather, it’s a dicey issue re: respect for cultural diversity, personal rights, what works out best for society, what individuals are going to do irregardless of legal sanctions. Etc.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/02/us/politics/abortion-arguments-post-roe.html
“Many legislators would be forced to argue over the most intimate details of transvaginal sonograms, conception and when exactly life begins.”
Personally, I think the relevant question is: “When does personhood begin?”
In nature, much incipient or potential life never manifests as a thriving organism. Among human beings, we think of a thriving individual as a “person.”
Some aboriginal tribal peoples would not name a child until they reached a certain age (two or three or four or even five). If a baby failed to thrive, the situation was not considered the death of a “person.”
Some groups have used infanticide to control population levels and it was not considered murder.
The mass of cells of an embryo has life. But I don’t consider an embryo or a fetus to be a person. I think righteousness is in birthing a child who is wanted and can be cared for . . . and therefore has a decent chance of becoming a thriving person. It’s better if every pregnancy and every baby born is wanted. If an unwanted pregnancy can’t be terminated, it’s bad for the woman, bad for society, and unpropitious for the baby born under those circumstances.
Nonetheless, there is bound to be cultural diversity, wherein groups decide how they want to relate to the issues involved with conception, life, and personhood. There are lots of areas where groups decide they want to sanction or discourage certain behaviors knowing full well that individuals will disobey (many unwanted pregnancies will be terminated no matter the legalities or the cultural norms).
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If we revert to state-based laws governing abortion and there are twenty states that effectively ban it, will pro-choice people move out of those states? Will the banning be mostly symbolic in some states to appease the anti-abortion segment of the population while the authorities essentially tolerate networks of private medical practictioners doing procedures unhassled in certain (probably urban) areas? Will abortion-rights activists in the banning states eventually prevail . . . maybe in the next generation or the one after that?
It seems simple to say: If you equate abortion with murder, refrain from having an abortion and encourage those you can influence to do likewise, however don’t try to pass laws that criminalize people having a different point of view. But that message has never resonated and one has to wonder if there will ever be any extent of final resolution.
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By the way, here’s my response to those who point to this issue as a reason why (they assert) third party “spoiling” can be pernicious: There are plenty of issues where the Democrats are better than the Republicans. A whole different consideration is how bad the only-two-choices system is in a general way.
Or:
If there are two parties, most people are likely to feel that one is better than the other. Naturally. What’s that got to do with the advocacy of a better electoral system?
