Forbidden Fruit
There are certain topics that we all want to avoid. It is not about polite company, it is about a thorny ethical conundrum that has no easy answers. We all like certainty whenever we can get it, and what that means is that where there is no certainty there is angst. Very few topics I can think of are as fraught with uncertainty as much as the topic of abortion is. We hang convenient and descriptive labels on the two sides which both are made to sound positive. There is pro-choice and pro-life. Who could possibly disagree with either of those two concepts? The problem is that only one of those descriptions is totally valid, and that is pro-choice. Leaving the decision about what a woman chooses to do with her body is central to those who advocate for the right to abortions. But pro-life advocates try to tell you that their position is about advocating for the unborn that cannot do so for themselves. Presumably, the pro-life forces want all women to carry to term regardless of the circumstances. Whether the pregnancy was originated by rape or incest or perhaps endangers the life of the mother unnecessarily or perhaps the family of the mother or even the quality of life of the unborn, does not seem to bother the forces of the pro-life contingent. In that way, they may be pro some life, but not so much for the others, especially the wellbeing of the mother.
I know that there are certainly female advocates of the pro-life position, but if the polling were taken, it seems almost certain that the rolls of the pro-life contingent would be vastly outnumbered by men rather than women. Why is that so? Are women less kindly towards infants? Quite the opposite. It seems clear that there is an inordinate measure of control and/or misogyny incorporated into the pro-life stance. In fact, one of the biggest complaints of the pro-choice contingent is that the forces against abortion access are heavily weighted by older white men, men who are dramatically distant from the impact of their prohibition. That brings to mind the temperance movement that led to the Volstead Act or the 18th Amendment, which for thirteen years produced some of the nations most raucous times not to mention some of the greatest growth in lawlessness. Strangely enough, the 18th Amendment garnered a super-majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives and was ratified by 46 of the then 48 states, having been brought to a fever pitch by the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. It was a case of those who preferred not to imbibe creating the momentum to ban something the vast majority of people of both sexes wanted. This was evident in the amount of illegal alcohol consumption during the 1920’s and the eventual repeal of the Volstead Act in 1933.
We seem to be again in the grips of such an aberration in social and political thought. After over fifty years of having abortion be a constitutional right for women, a minority group of fervent anti-abortionists has whipped up another frenzy and through long range tactical effectiveness, they have succeeded in populating the Supreme Court with like-minded anti-abortionists who have now successfully undone the constitutionality of abortions. The big difference between the two issues is that there was a great deal of fun and profit to be had during the 1920’s under the Volstead Act. It is fair to suggest that few if any will find much fun in having abortions go underground in some modern version of a medical speakeasy. Having a drink too many can certainly change the course of a life, but forbidding an abortion or causing a less sterile or controlled abortion to take place will almost certainly alter the course of many lives, most often for the worse (except, of course, for the fetus, who can hopefully grow to find a good life where there was none).
Unlike alcohol prohibition, which strangely garnered a majority of political and public support, abortion prohibition is only supported by a minority of Americans in both the political arena and in the general public, according to polls. That dubious position is thus the result of the tactical judicial situation which can only be remedied by several actions. The obvious one is to reposition the Supreme Court by increasing its size to something like fifteen members instead of the current roster of nine. The problem with that is that as political fortunes shift, the court could be the object of judicial inflation with fifteen growing to twenty-one and so on. The other action is a congressional lawmaking process that could change the law of the land and go so far as to establish a constitutional amendment. As we saw in 1933, nothing prevents such a law from getting thrown out in the future, but the same thing that makes that path so difficult for the pro-choice movement now (as it has been for the past fifty years), makes it difficult in the future. It is unclear that the divisiveness of our political arena would allow the super-majority needed to enact such legislation.
The White House and the Department of Justice (as though they do not have enough on their plates with the January 6th situation in full-swing) have certain capabilities to work through abortion alternatives using the pharmaceutical advances made in abortion administration as well as the remaining abortion enabling states. In an era of COVID and vaccine wariness and galvanized red versus blue states (not to mention purple states with red legislatures and blue executive branches), the White House and DOJ will find their help challenging to adequately muster.
None of these barriers or hardships will prevent the pro-choice fight from going forward. As sure as God made little green apples, he made sexual drive and resultant pregnancy of unwanted sorts with such unrelenting regularity. In fact, if Justice Thomas’s brief released today has its way, contraception will become harder to access and thereby abortion incidence will do nothing but increase in this aberrant moment. There are certain rights that people cannot live without and I feel very confident in suggesting that the right to abortions is so unalienable that this conflict will undoubtedly rage until this prohibition is once again lifted.
What a shame that at a time when the world is faced with an unrelenting global climate crisis that has already reached criticality, a global health crisis from the COVID pandemic and beyond, and a political/sociological trend swinging towards authoritarianism that is already disrupting global trade flows and upending economies, we have to suffer yet another society-wrenching quarrel that will force people into the streets in protest and conflict. There is a reason why some fruit is forbidden and I believe the sourest of forbidden fruit is that which takes the form of coercive prohibition, especially directed at the bodies of fully one half of the population.