Abortion has been legal in the United States since Roe v. Wade made it so in 1973. However, the way the pro-choice movement paints things, we're always just a step away from back-alley abortions with coat hangers if those Bible-thumping fundamentalists have their way and overturn Roe v. Wade.
Let's clear up a few misconceptions. First, it is extremely unlikely that abortion will ever be "banned" in this country. As Prohibition showed us, once Americans have the right to do something, they don't take kindly to losing that right. Combine that with the legal principle of stare decisis, which basically is a fancy term for "respecting precedent," and you have two very strong reasons why abortion will probably never be totally banned in this country.
Despite this, current abortion policy must definitely be re-examined. To pro-choice activists, any restrictions on abortion leads to a "slippery slope," with the end result being coat-hanger abortions. That is why pro-choice groups fight tooth and nail against any restriction, no matter how reasonable, against abortion.
For example, Gov. Schwarzenegger of California campaigned extensively for Proposition 73 in 2005, which would have banned an abortion for girls under the age of 18 until 48 hours after a physician had notified her parents. To oppose parental notification is simply absurd. In California, a minor is not allowed to get a piercing or a tattoo without parental consent. A minor can't even go to a tanning salon without a parent's OK. Even if I can't convince you to the pro-life side of the aisle, I hope I can at least get you to concede that an abortion should be considered more important than getting your ears pierced.
Another restriction on abortions that many pro-choicers will not speak out against is the partial-birth abortion. Perhaps a more accurate term would be infanticide. The fact that killing a partially born child can be considered acceptable is simply mind-boggling. Pro-choicers talk about having the right to choose whether they can have an abortion, but are they seriously saying that they need the whole nine months of conception to decide? It's not even like partial-birth abortions are mostly done for the health of the mother, which is, bluntly, a lie used by pro-choicers to defend the practice. According to an abortion doctor in Englewood, N.J., "Most [partial-birth abortions] are for elective, not medical reasons: people . didn't realize, or didn't care, how far along they were."
Pro-choicers are forced to lie about abortion because in a head-to-head, frank discussion of the facts, they would lose. Simply put, most Americans aren't as rabidly pro-choice as you would think. According to a Los Angeles Times poll conducted in 2000, two-thirds of Americans favor a ban on abortion after the first trimester, and over half of Americans think that abortion should only be legal to protect the life of the mother or in cases of rape or incest.
The problem with being pro-choice is that you have to defend abortion unequivocally. You can't ban abortion in the 35th week or for 14-year-olds, because to do so would lead to back-alley days again. Sen. Clinton declared in 2005 that abortion should be "safe, legal, and rare." So why is it that any time a restriction on abortion is suggested, it's treated like the Apocalypse? The way pro-choicers defend abortion would be like conservatives saying that the death penalty has to be used for any crime, because limiting it at all would lead to its eventual ban.
I realize that I could talk until the Second Coming about health risks associated with abortion, when life begins, etc., and I wouldn't convince most of you. Abortion has been legal for over 30 years, and a total ban on it is extremely improbable. However, the pro-choice movement needs to realize that some restriction on abortion is not completely out of the question. If they continue to fight any restriction on it, however, they, too, hold the risk of becoming irrelevant.
Caleb Enerson is a sophomore in the School of Public Affairs and a conservative columnist for The Eagle.
