South Dakota Inadvertantly Sets Back Anti-Abortion Movement
South Dakota's Republican Legislature has long been pushing the envelope in an attempt to undermine Roe vs. Wade with increasingly restrictive abortion laws. This past week, apparently sensing that the newly redecorated U.S. Supreme Court provided them a historic opening, they threw down the gauntlet and criminalized nearly all abortions in the state. Only women whose lives are directly threatened can undergo a legal abortion in South Dakota after the Governor signs this bill. Even the victims of rape and incest are forbidden from receiving the procedure.
I have never been a fan of abortion and have generally considered myself on the "pro-life" side of the issue, even though I recognize the political reality that criminalizing abortion would produce layer upon layer of disastrous consequences. Nonetheless, I doubt I'm alone in the ranks of marginal pro-lifers who have spent the last two days recoiling at the display of arrogance that South Dakotans have nationally embarrassed themselves with.
To be fair, the opinions of South Dakotans are not as unanimously wingnutty as the actions of their state government would seem to indicate. A recent Survey USA poll measured state-by-state attitudes on abortion, and South Dakotans were split right down the middle on "pro-choice" versus "pro-life" sentiment. And a poll this week indicated only 25% of the state's residents favor the complete abortion ban that appear inevitable to become state law. Those statistics alone indicate a possible backlash by South Dakota voters this fall. Otherwise safe incumbents could go the way of the 2005 Dover, Pennsylvania school board if voters are sufficiently disgusted by the looming national spotlight.
That national spotlight will not only portray South Dakotans as a bunch of deranged hicks who view pregnant women as mere "baby containers" exempted from basic medical (and human)rights, but it will also come with a hefty price tag. The state of South Dakota, one of the nation's poorest and least populated, will be forced to divert millions of dollars of its scant public resources to finance the legal challenges certain to be triggered by abortion rights groups. So South Dakota voters can expect to continue driving on Third World-quality highways and sending their kids to some of the worst schools in the nation, all in support of an oppressive anti-abortion stunt that the vast majority of them oppose. Sounds like a winning political strategy to me.
Tempted as I am to thoroughly shred the artificial pro-life position of the Republican Party faithful, I'll limit my criticism to this particular act of unimaginable conservative hubris. In their attempt to radically raise the stakes of the abortion debate and tilt public policy, South Dakota's pro-life zealots have most likely sabotaged any momentum they had in swaying public opinion against legalized abortion. Only hard-core anti-abortion activisits (a minority within a minority) support forcing teenage rape victims to carry their rapists' spawn inside of them for nine months. Marginal anti-abortion voters are likely to be so frightened at the prospect of the South Dakota Legislature dehumanizing their daughters this way that they will permanently distance themselves from the pro-life movement.
Pro-lifers have probably blown the progress that they made in swaying public opinion through baby steps (such as the popular but disingenuous "partial-birth abortion" issue, and parental notification laws). The South Dakota state government has revealed the endgame of the pro-life movement, and the shock and awe it will provoke in mainstream circles will likely set back public opinion on the issue at least 15 years, when Al Gore was poking fun at Dan Quayle in the 1992 Vice-Presidential debate for not supporting "a woman's right to choose." Few Democratic politicians, particularly in national elections, would make such a mockery of pro-life opponents this day and age. But the disgust likely to be generated by the media circus of debating whether rape victims should be able to terminate their pregnancies could easily marginalize anti-abortion defenders as badly as they were in 1992, if not worse.
I have never been a fan of abortion and have generally considered myself on the "pro-life" side of the issue, even though I recognize the political reality that criminalizing abortion would produce layer upon layer of disastrous consequences. Nonetheless, I doubt I'm alone in the ranks of marginal pro-lifers who have spent the last two days recoiling at the display of arrogance that South Dakotans have nationally embarrassed themselves with.
To be fair, the opinions of South Dakotans are not as unanimously wingnutty as the actions of their state government would seem to indicate. A recent Survey USA poll measured state-by-state attitudes on abortion, and South Dakotans were split right down the middle on "pro-choice" versus "pro-life" sentiment. And a poll this week indicated only 25% of the state's residents favor the complete abortion ban that appear inevitable to become state law. Those statistics alone indicate a possible backlash by South Dakota voters this fall. Otherwise safe incumbents could go the way of the 2005 Dover, Pennsylvania school board if voters are sufficiently disgusted by the looming national spotlight.
That national spotlight will not only portray South Dakotans as a bunch of deranged hicks who view pregnant women as mere "baby containers" exempted from basic medical (and human)rights, but it will also come with a hefty price tag. The state of South Dakota, one of the nation's poorest and least populated, will be forced to divert millions of dollars of its scant public resources to finance the legal challenges certain to be triggered by abortion rights groups. So South Dakota voters can expect to continue driving on Third World-quality highways and sending their kids to some of the worst schools in the nation, all in support of an oppressive anti-abortion stunt that the vast majority of them oppose. Sounds like a winning political strategy to me.
Tempted as I am to thoroughly shred the artificial pro-life position of the Republican Party faithful, I'll limit my criticism to this particular act of unimaginable conservative hubris. In their attempt to radically raise the stakes of the abortion debate and tilt public policy, South Dakota's pro-life zealots have most likely sabotaged any momentum they had in swaying public opinion against legalized abortion. Only hard-core anti-abortion activisits (a minority within a minority) support forcing teenage rape victims to carry their rapists' spawn inside of them for nine months. Marginal anti-abortion voters are likely to be so frightened at the prospect of the South Dakota Legislature dehumanizing their daughters this way that they will permanently distance themselves from the pro-life movement.
Pro-lifers have probably blown the progress that they made in swaying public opinion through baby steps (such as the popular but disingenuous "partial-birth abortion" issue, and parental notification laws). The South Dakota state government has revealed the endgame of the pro-life movement, and the shock and awe it will provoke in mainstream circles will likely set back public opinion on the issue at least 15 years, when Al Gore was poking fun at Dan Quayle in the 1992 Vice-Presidential debate for not supporting "a woman's right to choose." Few Democratic politicians, particularly in national elections, would make such a mockery of pro-life opponents this day and age. But the disgust likely to be generated by the media circus of debating whether rape victims should be able to terminate their pregnancies could easily marginalize anti-abortion defenders as badly as they were in 1992, if not worse.
posted by Mark at 12:13 PM
1 Comments:
I am very glad that my fellow Californians vetoed Prop 73, that would require parental notification for a minor to obtain an abortion. We Californians (of which 80% do not want Roe overturned and according to SUSA, pro-choice outdoes pro-life 65-28) do not want to see teen girls' privacy invaded just to make anti-choicers happy. (Unless these so-called "pro-lifers" support caring for the already-born, then they are not pro-life; they are anti-choice.)
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