Abortion Rights

Having a baby can be a big decision in someones life. The amount of time, money, and
planning alone you have to do before you commit to raising a human being for eighteen-plus
years is staggering and scary. And that pressure doesnt go away when the baby is accidental, or
a product of a rape. In comes the solution of an abortion. To put it simply, an abortion is the
removal of a developing fetus from the womb of the mother. This terminates the pregnancy
humanely and successfully. Abortions are useful because they reduce the amount of teen
mothers, the amount of children who grow up in poverty due to the family not being able to
support a child, and the amount of unhappy families who are only together because of said child.
However, many groups and people are vehemently against even the thought of abortions because
of morals, religion, and other things. It is ultimately up to the two people involved, the father and
the mother, whether to have an abortion. Abortions are a great thing that should be a universal
right.
In the United States fifteen states have [] unconstitutional and unenforceable neartotal criminal bans on abortion [] that go against Roe v. Wade. (Prochoiceamerica.org) Roe
v. Wade was the landmark Supreme Court case in the early seventies that set the course for
abortion legislation in the United States. Before Roe v. Wade, every state had abortion legislation
for over seventy years. Abortion was sometimes considered a common law crime, which is a
crime that has no legislation against it, but is considered a crime due to the precedent rulings of
other judges. A summary of Roe v. Wade is that in 1969, Norma McCorvey discovered that she
was pregnant with her third child and returned to her home in Dallas, Texas where friends gave
her the idea to cry rape to obtain a legal abortion.

This idea failed because there was no police report documenting said rape. She then went
the route of an illegal abortion, only to discover the underground clinic had been raided by the
police. She eventually came to attorneys Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington, who filed a suit on
the behalf of McCorvey under the alias of Jane Roe. The defendant was Dallas County District
Attorney Henry Wade, representing the state of Texas. The case eventually worked its way
through the district courts, eventually coming before the Supreme Court where in the court
issued a 7-to-2 decision in favor of Roe where the right to have an abortion was henceforth
deemed a fundamental right under the United States Constitution. This ruling was justified by the
Fourteenth Amendments right to privacy, which was determined to be broad enough to include a
womans decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.
But is Roe v. Wade enough? Most advocates of abortion rights do not think so. While it
should be enough to allow abortions in all fifty states, two of the aforementioned states that have
unconstitutional bans on abortion enacted said bans after Roe v. Wade. Elizabeth Nash, the
Statue Issues Manager for the Guttmacher Institute, said "There has been a widespread assault on
abortion rights and access at the state level. Between 2011 and 2013, there were 205 abortion
restrictions enacted in 30 states and the types of restrictions enacted are more burdensome and
extreme than those we were seeing just a few years before." (guttmacher.org/)
But the idea of when life begins in the womb is the key argument in every abortion
debate. For those who are for abortions, the idea of life beginning is usually around twenty-one
weeks. This time period is when the fetus begins to kick or move around in the womb, and is
called the quickening and refers back to an old tradition in which it is seen as the start of
person-hood (Wikipedia.org).

However, the Supreme Court uses this period of twenty one weeks as a sort of divider;
stating that a state may only ban abortions after this period, if they are to do so. There is more
reason in this being the determining time-period other than an old tradition. The earliest
premature birth was during the twenty-one week period, a whole two weeks before a baby is
thought to be viable, or be able to survive outside of the womb.
For most pro-life advocates however, life begins at conception. Whenever the sperm cell
hits the ovum, and forms the zygote; it becomes an alive organism. And many biologists agree. It
is essentially a living organism, living as much as our red blood cells are. But it is only about the
size of a human hair at this point. It is in this that one must make the decision whether to believe
if it is a living organism or not.
However, it is known that the survival rate for babies born at twenty-five weeks is around
fifty percent. And while that might seem like a worthwhile risk, about half of those successful
premature births end up with the baby being permanently disabled (Disabled meaning cerebral
palsy, visual/hearing impairment, blindness, etc.) (Preemiesurvival.org) So is a baby even
viable at twenty-four weeks? Or even at thirty-two weeks, where babies born then still need
medical intervention and still run risks of being disabled? Abortion may seem cruel to some, but
it is a necessity to be able to choose whether or not you want to care for another living being for
eighteen years (and perhaps then some).
It is ultimately a war of morality, religion, and cultural beliefs. Abortion can be defined as
many things; and shined in many different lights. But what matters in the end is if there is even a
choice to be made. Or if one should be restricted in everything they do, and every choice they
make. Louise Melling, Director of the ACLU wrote in her article Common Hopes in 2009.
"We know that women have abortions for many reasons. Even if we disagree on the issue of

abortion, we can agree that these are private personal decisions we all must be able to make
based on our own circumstances, beliefs, and values. We should respect and support a woman
and her family as they face the life-altering decision of whether to have a child. It is neither my
place nor our government's place to make such an important life decision for someone else... We
all care about life and about doing our best for the people we love. When we bring children into
the world we want them to have the opportunity to live a good life. And we want to build a better
future for our children and our grandchildren. Abortion and reproductive freedom more broadly
defined are important pieces of ensuring this common dream. To obtain a better future, we each
must be free to make profoundly personal decisions about our reproductive lives without
unwarranted government intrusion. As with all freedoms, there are limits. But a government that
respects the personal integrity of its people both interferes in these essentially private decisions
as little as possible and helps ensure that everyone has the opportunity to make these decisions
responsibly." (ACLU.org)

Works Cited:

"Abortion Bans Throughout Pregnancy." NARAL Pro-Choice America. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Apr.
2014.

"Abortion in the United States." Guttmacher. Guttmacher.org, n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.

"Premature Birth Statistics." Quint Boenker Preemie Survival Foundation. N.p., n.d. Web. 10
Apr. 2014.

"Quickening." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 04 May 2014. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.

"When Does Life Begin?" GOPlifer. GOPlifer, n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.

Melling, Louise. "Common Hopes." American Civil Liberties Union. ACLU.org, 22 Jan. 2009.
Web. 10 Apr. 2014.