Quite not surprising is the fate of Rowe vs. Wade Opinion

Kate Querham

Being a woman in this country is often felt as an exercise in futility. It repeatedly exposes your soul and shares personal and intimate stories hoping to prove that you deserve fundamental rights, only to get slapped by decisions that clearly deny your own experience. It’s exhausting. I rarely run out of words, but I literally don’t have enough words to explain how exhausting it is.

We are here. We shout. And we did not go unnoticed. Most people understand what we are saying. Most of them agree with us. But for responsible people it doesn’t matter. They don’t care. They prefer to ignore us. Their goal is our silence, so I know that the struggle will continue. There is no other choice. We will continue to exist, no matter how much you want us to. But please listen to me when I tell you: we are exhausted.

Politico published on Monday night draft conclusion from the U.S. Supreme Court, which would overturn Rowe v. Wade, a landmark case that upheld the constitutional right to abortion. By historyFive of the six conservative judges – Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alita Jr., Neil M. Gorsach, Brett M. Cavanaugh and Amy Connie Barrett – voted to repeal the law in December. An opinion cited by an unnamed source was cited as the first draft and is not legally binding, meaning judges may request a review or revoke their votes altogether.

But forgive me for not being. The leaked decision is the long-awaited culmination of decades of work by right-wing activists that began as a way take care of Catholic voters and turned into a complete attack on the autonomy of women’s bodies. Rowe guaranteed access to abortion, yes, but it also pushed legions of anti-choice groups that began testing the limits of the law almost immediately after it was passed.

This attack continues through objections a most Americanswho do not want the U.S. Supreme Court to ban the procedure. Many of the same voters are speaking restrictions on abortionincluding some that the court had before declared unconstitutional. This is contradictory and not surprising. Abortion is difficult and confusing, even if politicians do not shape it dishonestly to promote their own programs.

Here is the truth about abortion. A quarter of women will have one by the end of their childbearing age. (In other words, if you personally know four women, you probably know someone who has had an abortion.) Most of those women not married. They never had an abortion before they had to have an abortion. They are already mothers. They don’t make a lot of money. And they have the first six weeks of pregnancy.

I give these statistics reluctantly. This is a pathetic attempt to justify the right to abortion, illustrating that this procedure is not just for lewd people who are pregnant because they can’t worry about using contraceptives. Maybe if we do, I think the Conservatives will understand better. But this ignores the bigger point, which is that the right to abortion is not due to the reason why the person is having an abortion. Abortion is a medical procedure and a personal choice that is not relevant to your case unless you make a decision.

Politicians do not care about abortion

And it’s still a moot point because anti-abortion politicians don’t care. They don’t care how you got pregnant. They don’t care if you were raped by a stranger or a family member. They don’t care if you’re beaten or not insured. They don’t care if the birth of a child violates your career goals, education, relationships or life. They don’t care if you don’t want to have a baby. They don’t care about you, period.

They also don’t care about your baby. If they did, they would subsidize your pre- and postpartum care. They would advocate for universal childcare, affordable housing and financial assistance for healthy eating, mixes and diapers. They would advocate for mandatory paid family leave. They will do none of this. Their chosen surname is “for life”, but it is much more accurate to call them “for birth”.

People will challenge this characteristic as too harsh. I don’t care. I invite these people to provide me with facts and statistics to prove me wrong. I will wait for this proof all my life, because it is not there.

But here are some facts that exist. Republicans introduced hundreds of measures against abortion over the last decade. In 2021, the states set a record 108 restrictions on abortion. This includes Texas law which prohibits abortion after six weeks of pregnancy and counts on citizens filing lawsuits against anyone who gets or helps someone have an abortion. Anyone who succeeds is eligible for a $ 10,000 sentence.

So far this year, lawmakers in 42 states have introduced 532 restrictions for abortion. Thirty-three of these proposals were accepted, including a ban on the procedure after 15 weeks of pregnancy in Florida and the law in Oklahoma that attracts doctors to criminal offenses to perform abortions for any reason other than emergency medical care. No policy allows exceptions for victims of rape or incest.

These are just the newest restrictions. If Rowe falls, 26 states may completely ban abortions. Thirteen states will do so automatically through laws that take effect when the U.S. Supreme Court overturns the law; an additional five have bans to Roe that will become legal again after this decision.

If Congress does not codify the right to abortion (it won’t), there is no way to block policies at the state level if the draft decision is in force. President Joe Biden acknowledged this, speaking Tuesday that in the event of Rowe’s abolition, “the protection of our country’s right to choose will be the responsibility of our country’s elected officials at all levels of government.”

“And voters have to elect officials who support the election in November this year,” he said in a statement. “At the federal level, we will need more senators for election and a majority in the House of Representatives to pass legislation codifying Rowe, and I will work to pass and sign the law.”

This means that your ability to make your own choices regarding your own body will depend completely from where you live. As a rule, you will find it easier to access abortions blue states than the reds. For example, abortion would be essentially banned in ruby ​​red texas according to the draft court decision, but the procedure will remain legal under the state statute in democracy-controlled Nevada and Colorado. These states are hundreds of miles apart, but in reality after Row it may be different worlds.

The decision gives new meaning to the upcoming elections in the states of battle like Pennsylvaniawhere access to abortion may depend on the outcome of the gubernatorial race, and Michigan where it may depend on who becomes Attorney General. This again forces women and minorities to whirl in the wind, waiting on the hooks for details of the latest policies to disproportionately affect them. And it underscores the need to vote – not just for president, not just every four years, but consistently, even if you may prefer another candidate, even if the favorite used a private server for some of her lettersI mean, can you even?

Why are we here

Elections are said to have consequences. We are here because of Donald Trump, the president for one term who harmed democracy but still had to appoint three judges to the U.S. Supreme Court. We are here because of U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Who took a vacancy in court during President Barack Obama’s last term but refused to follow his own precedent when another seat opened in the last months of Trump’s one-term presidency.

We are here because of Judge Clarence Thomas, who remains an active member of the Supreme Court despite marrying a woman who helped coordinate attempts to overthrow the 2020 election. We are here because of U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), a Republican who is in favor of the election, who voted to confirm Cavanaugh and Gorsach because they promised her that they would consider Rowe a deal.

“If this leaked draft opinion is the final decision and this report is accurate, it will be completely incompatible with what Judge Gorsach and Judge Kavanagh said at their hearings and at our meetings in my office,” Collins said Tuesday. in a statement after the pen. knocked her down right! “Obviously, we will not know the decisions and arguments of each judge until the Supreme Court officially announces its opinion on the case.”

But mostly we are here because of the Republican Party, or rather because of its hypocrisy. Republicans are a party of “small government” and “family values,” except when it comes to the decisions a woman makes regarding her family and her own body. Republicans believe the laws are ineffective in banning guns, but believe the same laws prevent abortion. They are “for life” except when it comes to caring for living women or listening to them. (Information on the draft decision, Republicans were reluctant to issue policies to close gaps in antenatal care and family leave. But they did condemn the leak.)

In fact, Republicans are loyal only to the government. They will take as much as we allow. You may shrug and think that abortion does not affect you, but abortion is just the beginning. After all, someday, they may come for your autonomy. Can’t imagine that world? Must be nice. Personally, I can’t relate.

This column was originally published in the Evening Wrap, the national newsletter of the State Editorial Office, which you can subscribe here. The state edition is supported by Pennsylvania Capital-Star.