{"id":833,"date":"2009-04-29T10:00:26","date_gmt":"2009-04-29T10:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/stevenwaldman\/2009\/04\/do-pro-choice-activists-actual.html"},"modified":"2009-04-29T10:00:26","modified_gmt":"2009-04-29T10:00:26","slug":"do-pro-choice-activists-actual","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/stevenwaldman\/2009\/04\/do-pro-choice-activists-actual.html","title":{"rendered":"Do Pro-Choice Activists Actually Believe in Roe v. Wade?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Several commenters have suggested that my “safe, legal & early” argument<\/a> is the same as Roe v. Wade.
\nfreelunch writes:<\/p>\n

“Steve has discovered the decisions in Roe v. Wade. It is the law of the land already. I don’t know if Steve is being silly in some way or really had no idea what our laws are.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As I wrote in the full piece<\/a>, some of what I’m arguing is indeed congruent with the original spirit of Roe v. Wade — which did not<\/em> give an unfettered right to abortion. It gave the woman total autonomy in the first trimester, allowed for restrictions in the second and allowed for outright bans in the third trimester. The woman’s right became less absolute as the clock ticked.
\nBehold this quote from the majority decision by Harry Blackmun in Roe:<\/p>\n

“Appellant and some amici argue that the woman’s right is absolute and that she is entitled to terminate her pregnancy at whatever time, in whatever way, and for whatever reason she alone chooses. With this we do not agree.” <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, the position among most pro-choice political activists has, in a sense, evolved away from that part of Roe.
\nThe first issue is the “life and health” exemption. Roe said abortions, even in later parts of pregnancy, needed to be allowed to protect the life and health of the mother. Simultaneous with the Roe decision, the Supreme Court handed down Doe v. Bolton, which defined life and health in a very broad way, effectively making it harder to regulate second or even third trimester abortions. “Judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors–physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age–relevant to the wellbeing of the patient,” Justice Blackmun wrote in Doe. “All these factors may relate to health.”
\nOver time, with further court rulings, some pro-choice leaders have come to view any restrictions as an erosion of a fundamental right to choose at any point in the pregnancy. Hence, pro choice groups sometimes block efforts to ban “born alive” <\/a>abortions or “partial birth” abortions on the ground that it would infringe on the inviolable right to abortion.
\nBut if you look at Roe alone — without the subsequent jurisprudence and political theory that has grown up around it — there is no absolute right to abortion. It is a sliding right — one in which the woman has absolute authority in the beginning, and less and less over time.
\nMy argument also differs from Roe in this sense: it’s not just about “rights”; it’s about what kinds of decisions women make once they have that right. Many American women who want abortion to be legal nonetheless wish they’d happen as early as possible.
\nHence, I’m arguing for a new approach to public policy, one in which incorporates the question of timing into all abortion discussions. For instance, we usually talk about parental notification rules in yay-or-nay terms. Under a “safe, legal, early” framework, we might say no notification requirements early on and tight requirements in the third trimester.
\nYou can read the full argument here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Several commenters have suggested that my “safe, legal & early” argument is the same as Roe v. Wade. freelunch writes: “Steve has discovered the decisions in Roe v. Wade. It is the law of the land already. I don’t know if Steve is being silly in some way or really had no idea what our…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nDo Pro-Choice Activists Actually Believe in Roe v. 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