{"id":47,"date":"2003-03-10T10:42:29","date_gmt":"2003-03-10T18:42:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2003\/03\/10\/the-politics-of-partial-birth-abortion-bans\/"},"modified":"2003-03-10T10:42:29","modified_gmt":"2003-03-10T18:42:29","slug":"the-politics-of-partial-birth-abortion-bans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=47","title":{"rendered":"The politics of "partial-birth abortion" bans"},"content":{"rendered":"

So the Senate is banning partial-birth abortion<\/a> again.<\/p>\n

\n

But opponents of the ban say it is about abortion politics, not about a true effort to limit late-term abortions.<\/p>\n

“The phrase so-called ‘partial-birth abortion’ does not describe a recognized medical procedure. Rather, it is an inflammatory term invented by abortion opponents to provoke legislators and the public,” the American Civil Liberties Union said.<\/p>\n

“The legislation before the Senate would seriously compromise women’s health and drastically limit physicians’ discretion to choose the most medically appropriate abortion method for their patients,” it added.<\/p>\n

The bill would make it illegal to perform a “partial-birth” abortion except to save the life of a woman — although backers of the ban say there is never a case when it is in fact a necessary life-saving procedure. Doctors could face up to two years in prison plus fines.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Unlike previous bans, this one will not be vetoed by President Clinton (although it probably will<\/a> be overturned by the Supreme Court). Assuming it does pass and is overturned, I think this could actually be a good thing for pro-choice politics in the US.<\/p>\n

There’s a tendency, in the US, to characterize the abortion debate as a clash of extremists. I don’t think this is accurate. Even moderates on the pro-life side favor using the police to compel pregnant women to give birth against their will – which is, by most standards, an extreme stance. The most moderate pro-life position imaginable is still an extreme position (government-mandated childbirth is the essence of the pro-life position; if you don’t favor using state force to make pregnant woman give birth against their will, you’re not pro-life).<\/p>\n

While there are some extremist pro-choicers – like me – who favor absolute abortion on demand until the moment of childbirth, we’re not in control of the pro-choice movement, or the Democratic party. On the contrary, the Democrats – including Democrats who are strongly supported by Planned Parenthood and NARAL – have proposed and supported late-term abortion bans again and again. (Here’s the current proposal<\/a>). These bills would have banned late-term abortions except to protect the life and health of the mother, would have been constitutional, and would not have been vetoed by Clinton.<\/p>\n

But republicans have prevented these bans from being voted on, again and again. Why? Because their goal isn’t to ban late-term abortions; it’s to create the illusion that the Democrats favor late-term abortions. The purpose isn’t to change the law; the purpose is to display gigantic photographs of bloody baby corpses on the floor of congress and ask how Democrats can favor such a thing. A constitutional bill that would actually<\/em> ban needless late-term abortions would be supported by Democrats – which would ruin the picture pro-lifers want to paint of equal extremists on both sides of the issue.<\/p>\n

(Along these lines, it’s interesting to notice that some pro-life activists<\/a> who aren’t<\/em> Republican party spinners oppose the “partial-birth” abortion ban, because they correctly recognize that it wouldn’t prevent any actual abortions from taking place. Link via Diotima<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The debate isn’t over “do we ban late-term abortions or not?” Both<\/em> parties favor banning late-term abortions. The debate is over “do we define late-term abortions in a manner that would pass court scrutiny, and with an exception to protect the mother’s life or health; or do we define it vaguely, and without protecting the mother’s health, so that the courts will near-definitely strike it down?”<\/p>\n

The legislative debate, in other words, is between centrist pro-choice democrats, and extremist pro-life republicans. Extremist pro-choicers like me – who think women have an absolute right to abortion for any reason, at any stage of pregnancy – exist, but we aren’t really part of this debate. Our legislation isn’t on the table.<\/p>\n

If passing an unconstitutional bill (and having it signed by the White House) takes the “partial birth” abortion issue off the table for a while, that would be excellent for the Democrats. (It may be the Republicans see it this way too – look at how long it’s taken them to bring this to the floor since Bush was elected). The only hope Republicans really have is to placate their pro-life voters with side issues like these. The closer the abortion debate moves to the core issue – which is, do we want police enforcing childbirth on unwilling pregnant women? – the less happy Republicans will be.<\/p>\n

.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So the Senate is banning partial-birth abortion again. But opponents of the ban say it is about abortion politics, not about a true effort to limit late-term abortions. “The phrase so-called ‘partial-birth abortion’ does not describe a recognized medical procedure. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[109,3,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-partial-birth-abortion","category-abortion-reproductive-rights","category-elections-and-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}