Antiabortion Initiatives Divide Movement

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The Wall Street Journal

Antiabortion Initiatives Divide Movement
By T.W. FARNAM
April 21, 2008; Page A4

Abortion opponents are pushing ballot measures in five states this year. But the campaigns show as much division as unity in the antiabortion movement. In California, an initiative would add that state to the long list that currently requires doctors to notify parents before giving abortions to minors. In Missouri, abortion foes are trying to require psychological examination to show the woman isn't acting under duress. State officials say the law as written would be tantamount to a ban, but advocates dispute that.

In South Dakota, activists have revived a measure defeated two years ago that directly outlaws abortion. They have modified the proposal to try to boost support, adding new exceptions for the health of the mother and cases of rape or incest. In Colorado and Montana, abortion opponents are taking a newly popular tack, promoting constitutional amendments that give legal rights to human embryos.

Behind the varying measures is a philosophical split among antiabortion groups. Some want to promote measures that ban abortion outright, directly challenging the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion. Others prefer to chip away at abortion rights by limiting the types of procedures allowed, or finding other ways to limit access. The moves in South Dakota, Colorado and Montana take a direct approach. The California proposal embraces the more modest strategy.

The incremental approach has had some success, such as a federal ban on a procedure called dilation and extraction or "partial-birth abortion." That ban was upheld by the Supreme Court last year, but critics in the antiabortion movement argue that and similar changes only make abortions more acceptable to the public. That has reinvigorated some activists to try novel ways to challenge basic abortion rights, such as the ballot measures this year giving legal rights to embryos. No such law exists in any state. But if enacted, a state constitutional amendment bestowing personhood rights at conception could lead to lawsuits challenging not only abortion but also in vitro fertilization, embryonic-stem-cell research and some forms of birth control.

While a direct abortion ban would be illegal under Roe, changing the definition of personhood could undercut the legal argument behind that ruling, proponents argue. Justice Harry Blackmun wrote for the court in Roe that if a fetus were defined as a person by law, the case "collapses" because the due-process protections of the 14th Amendment would have to be taken into account. Some more established antiabortion groups such as the National Right to Life Committee and Focus on the Family haven't gotten behind these initiatives. The top lawyer for the National Right to Life Committee has said that they could backfire because the Supreme Court would likely reject these challenges to Roe -- and that an unfavorable ruling could make the job of overturning precedent even more difficult later.


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[murielm99]

1. All the more reason to defeat McCain:

We need to be sure the Supreme Court keep Roe v. Wade.