Ruth Institute Blog

by G. Tracy Mehan III

Despite recent state restrictions and a growth in pro-life sentiment, more than a million lives are lost to abortion each year in the US.

Americans are a mixed bag in terms of their attitudes toward abortion and the humanity of unborn children. It is an interesting question whether or not the 1973 Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, along with its companion case, Doe v. Bolton, actually kept these issues alive when they might have been consigned to ultimate invisibility by cultural regression and political inertia.

Some argue that the states were already moving to liberalize abortion law, thereby clothing the shift with political legitimacy resulting from democratic and legislative processes. This, in the long run, would have enshrined an unchallenged license to abort with barely a ripple, let alone public outcry. But, by clearing the board of all prohibitions on abortion in most of the 50 states, and establishing a new constitutional right for all nine months of pregnancy by judicial fiat, the high court energized an indigenous right-to-life movement without parallel in the world.

The United States still has a vibrant movement resisting the culture of death, a tenacious rear-guard action designed to impose restrictions on abortion providers comparable to those required for other medical providers. Truly, the witness to the sanctity of life is still strong in many parts of the country.

Over 1 million lives lost each year

Nevertheless, 1.2 million lives are lost to abortion every year, a number which has remained stable over the past decade after a slight decline from higher levels previously attained. In New York, Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan has decried the 90,000 abortions performed annually in the city, which is twice the national rate: “I’m frankly embarrassed to be a member of a community where 41 percent of pregnancies are terminated,” he said in late 2011. The rate is closer to 60 percent for black women in Gotham.

The Big Apple is an extreme case. Still, with almost 40 percent of American births out of wedlock, and even higher proportions of non-marital births for African-American and Hispanic women, it is no surprise that segments of the population are still availing themselves of abortion “services” provided with government support.

Yet, American attitudes on abortion remain conflicted. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found 63 percent of Americans saying that Roe v. Wade should not be completely overturned, versus 29 percent who said it should. Such a binary choice presented to the poll’s respondents fails to provide for shades of opinion which might vary depending on the stage of pregnancy, the reason for the abortion, and who is paying for it.

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