The Future of Women’s Right to Choose
In 2016, Republicans are threatening to remove access to safe and legal abortions
By Alyssa Reyes
The Progressive Teen Staff Writer
IN CELEBRATION OF WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH, I’ve dedicated a series of articles addressing issues that women face today and in the past. The barriers they have broken and the barriers they have yet to break. For this week it’s about the Future of Women’s Right to Choose.
On January 22, 1973, the Supreme Court legalized a woman’s right to choose in the United States with its landmark decision in Roe v. Wade. This Supreme Court case ruled to nullify the laws of 46 states that renders abortion to be illegal. The Supreme Court affirmed that a woman’s right to privacy under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment extended to a woman’s decision to have an abortion, but this right must be balanced against the state’s two legitimate interests in regulating abortions: protecting women’s health and protecting the potentiality of human life. This decision changed our country by upholding women’s right to choose and access safe and legal abortions.
Despite 43 years of Roe v. Wade being in effect, attacks on abortion have increased drastically in the last 6 years. From 2010 to 2016, 318 restrictions on abortions have been passed by state lawmakers. The number of restrictions on abortion passed in the last 6 years nearly equates to the 344 restrictions passed in 1985 to 2009. Currently the Supreme Court is hearing a case, Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt. It concerns a deceptive Texan law upheld by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that is deceptively designed to shut down more than 75 percent of all woman’s health clinics that provide abortion services in the state. In an attempt to go around the constitution and four decades of Supreme Court precedent, anti-abortion politicians in Texas passed a law named HB2 in 2013. They introduced this law unscrupulously basking under the smug banality of protecting women’s health and safety. But HB2 halters clinics with unnecessary medical regulations making it harder for them to be allowed to operate. Rendering it harder to obtain safe and legal abortion care.
We cannot let the GOP candidates hinder the hard fought progress that we get to cherish today, by removing access to safe and legal abortions and taking back a woman’s right to choose.
Politicians and GOP Presidential candidates have made it clear that they will stop at nothing to end the access to safe and legal abortions. Instead of planning to move our country forward, presidential hopefuls, in the likes of Ted Cruz, already have plans to undermine Roe v. Wade using the 14th Amendment. In an interview, he stated, “I think the first obligation of every public official is to protect someone’s life… I very much agree with the with the pope’s longstanding and prior popes’ before him longstanding call to protect every human life from the moment of conception to the moment of natural death.” He is not the only one, in fact, all 4 of them vowed to ban abortion once they are elected, depriving women of their right to choose for themselves forcing them to go back in time to back-alley abortions.
“Every election, people say, ‘This is about the future of the Supreme Court and the Constitution.’ This time it’s true,” said Georgetown University constitutional law professor David Cole. This coming election is very critical. It is guaranteed, should a republican becomes President of the United State, Roe v. Wade can be affected drastically. A Republican President could help pass even more abortion restrictions despite the public’s need and support for safe and legal abortions.
Since the passing of the late Associate Justice Antonin Scalia, Republican Senators and President Obama are gearing for a contentious nominating process. In subordination of the oath they took for public office, Republican Senators have threatened the President that they will not hold hearing for Justice Scalia’s replacement. They contended that the American people should have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court Justice, they argued that the vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president. Using their own standards the American people have already chosen through 65,915,796 votes that Barack Obama is America’s President until January 20, 2016. As President, through the power vested in him by the constitution “he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint … Judges of the Supreme Court…”. The decent and patriotic thing to do for Republican Senators is to allow fair hearings for President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee.
If you want women’s rights to be staunchly considered by the next president of the United States, support the two democratic nominees this primary election.
The court, before Justice Scalia’s death was almost evenly split by ideology, with four conservative-leaning justices, four on the liberal side and one — Justice Anthony Kennedy, known as the “swing voter” — in the middle — and just as likely on almost any issue to go either way. But with the passing of Justice Scalia, the ideological makeup of the court is three conservative-leaning justices, four liberal-leaning justices and 1 swing vote. The vacancy in the Supreme Court is one of the most pivotal issue in the Presidential campaigns. The next president might have the opportunity to appoint two to three Supreme Court justices, excluding Justice Scalia’s seat if Republican Senators find it in their conscience to do their job. Rendering it to be the most progressive court in recent decades.
With all the threats to women’s choice from the Supreme Court cases to defunding Planned Parenthood, a Democrat should be elected president this coming elections or all the progress we have gained with women’s health would be undermined and nullified. We cannot let the GOP candidates hinder the hard fought progress that we get to cherish today, by removing access to safe and legal abortions and taking back a woman’s right to choose.
Currently, in the Democratic Party we have two great candidates: Bernie Sanders, a democratic socialist whose outcry of economic inequality resonates profoundly with the youth and Hillary Clinton, a potential first female president of the United States who promised to break down barriers for women, children, and families so they can all live up to their God given potentials. Both these candidates viewed that women’s right to choose is a decision that the woman herself must make, not the government.
If you want women’s rights to be staunchly considered by the next president of the United States, support the two democratic nominees this primary election. But when the people have decided who the Democratic Party’s nominee for President is, we need to unite as a party with our shared vision of building on the progress made by President Barrack Obama. We need to continue our efforts in developing our country on what it’s supposed to be today and tomorrow, not what it has been yesterday.
America is great in fact it never stopped being great, but if we unite together, America can become even greater. Let’s bridge our divide and let’s work together in getting the eventual Democratic nominee elected. Let’s fight for him/her so he/she can fight for us.
