Abortion in the United States

Résumé du document

In the modern world, one can observe the growing success of anti-abortion actions in the United States whereas the law is supposed to ensure safe and medical abortion.
Besides, abortion has become a part of everyday politics (like the death penalty). For instance, in the presidential campaign candidates were forced to express themselves on this issue. For example, the National Republican Committee denies any participation to a candidate who would declare he supports abortion. First, we will discuss how abortion was legalized and then analyze the growing contestation of abortion.

Extraits

[...] From 1973, there has been a constant fight between pro-choice and pro-life partisans. II. The growing contestation of the abortion right The worrying problem of the access to abortion The limitation of the right of abortion by the Supreme Court There have been 26 Supreme Court decisions on abortion since 1973 but I will just mention two of them and will not detail them precisely because it would be quite long. I will first mention the Webster vs Reproductive Health Services which opened the door to state regulation of abortion. [...]

[...] One of the most dangerous and violent anti-choice extremists, Eric Rudolph, is on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List. Pro-life violence is a main reason for the decrease of abortion clinics and is more and more worrying. Conclusion In this context, we cannot say that the law is being respected because abortion, which is already a traumatizing process, has also become a threat. Therefore, since abortion has very few defenders and Supreme Court merely restricted Roe vs Wade we can really wonder about the real access to this fundamental right of women over their own bodies. [...]

[...] Wade in Etudes du CERI. Janvier 1997. n°22. 4°6533] D. CUSTOS. La Cour Suprême américaine et la liberté d'avortement in Revue du droit public et de la science politique en France et à l'étranger. Sept-Oct 1995. Roe vs Wade: 25 years later. [...]

[...] Mainly, they were middle and upper class married women who already had children and thought they had enough. But, anyway, ethics and morality were not the main reason why abortion was forbidden. It was just a pretext, a plea. Indeed, restrictive laws about abortion were voted by the states under the pressure of the AMA (the American Medical Association). US physicians felt the practice of abortion was a concurrent one and they wanted to regulate this parallel medicine and make it disappear. [...]

[...] It means that, in practice, abortion is being restricted. A recent survey found that 84% of all US counties have no identifiable abortion provider and the figure rises to 94% in rural areas. Therefore, women have to travel long distances to reach the nearest abortion provider. Distance is not the only barrier: many legislators are committed to bringing an end to legal abortion and have passed laws that have drastically diminished access to abortion. These include: Parental Consent or Notification Laws can violate the privacy of young women by forcing them to involve their parents in their decisions, even when they have strong objections to doing so. [...]