Timeline for Why is abortion such a central issue in US politics, but not in the UK?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
24 events
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| Jun 24, 2022 at 21:37 | history | edited | reirab | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
updated to reflect that information is now outdated, due to Roe and Casey being overturned.
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| May 3, 2022 at 6:42 | history | edited | reirab | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added note about answer likely being outdated soon
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| Apr 24, 2022 at 3:47 | comment | added | reirab | @Acccumulation Unlikely that such a distinction would stand. That would be like exempting certain neighborhoods from murder laws where [insert demographic of choice here] are more likely to live. Clearly an intentional violation of equal protection But, at any rate, irrelevant to the point of the answer and, as mentioned, the Supreme Court apparently disagreed with your assessment. | |
| Apr 24, 2022 at 1:22 | comment | added | Acccumulation | You are simply ignoring my statement "If there's a law saying that people can abort pregnancies, that's facially neutral law." It's not distinguishing between classes of persons, it's distinguishing between circumstances. | |
| Apr 24, 2022 at 0:43 | comment | added | reirab | @Acccumulation There are laws against murder in every state. It does follow from the equal protection clause that a murder statute must protect everyone equally, that is, you can't have a murder statue that criminalizes killing some classes of persons, but not others. It's not that the 14th would be self-executing, but rather that existing murder/manslaughter/violation of civil rights under color of law statutes would make it illegal. The quote explicitly says that, if the unborn child is a person, then their "right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the [14th] Amendment" | |
| Apr 23, 2022 at 21:05 | comment | added | Guy F-W | "Having this child would affect my ability to pay rent" -> "Thinking about having this child is affecting my mental/emotional health" -> "I need an abortion". Under US counting, this would be 'economic' reasons; under UK counting it would be 'mental health of the mother', but it's the same situation. I think this answer thus fundamentally misunderstands the available data. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 20:42 | comment | added | Acccumulation | If there's a law saying that people can abort pregnancies, that's facially neutral law. That this will result in the death of some "persons" and not others is an indirect result. So it does not automatically follow that such a law violates the 14th. As for your quote, that just says that people would not be able to advance arguments on the basis of a right to abortion, it doesn't say the 14th would be self-executing. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 19:50 | comment | added | reirab | @Acccumulation As for citation, "If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant's case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment." - Majority Opinion, Roe v. Wade, Section IX, subsection A, paragraph 1 (In context, "the Amendment" is the 14th Amendment.) | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 19:48 | comment | added | reirab | @Acccumulation As for the 14th, it requires equal protection under the law for all persons. So, you can't have a statute that protects life (or property, etc., but life is the relevant part here) of one class of persons while not protecting that of another equally. Whether that's black people, female people, unborn people, people born on a Tuesday, etc., state laws must provide equal protection to all persons. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 19:43 | comment | added | reirab | @Acccumulation Sorry if my meaning was unclear. By 'circumstances,' I meant the circumstances of the pregnancy, i.e. the reason for the abortion. Not necessarily the circumstances surrounding how the procedure itself is done. Limits are allowed there. As for the 4th, 'liberty' there means that you can't be incarcerated without due process, not that you can do anything you want. Clearly, that is not the case and was never intended (nor did plaintiffs in Roe argue that nor courts rule it.) | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 19:40 | comment | added | Acccumulation | You didn't say "for virtually all reasons", you said "circumstances. The Constitution specifically says liberty is to be protected. "nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law" It doesn't say no state shall deprive any person of specific liberties, it just says "liberty". And while it's possible that all justices agree that if fetuses were considered persons, there would be no right to abortion, the idea that that would ban abortion is absurd, and I'll need a cite for that. The 14th amendment is not self-executing. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 18:44 | comment | added | WS2 | @MichaelKay Not everyone breaks the 70mph speed limit without challenge - for I have points on a, now very old, driving licence to prove that is not the case! | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 18:31 | comment | added | reirab | @Acccumulation The restrictions in place don't limit the reasons for which one may get an abortion. Elective abortions are explicitly legal throughout per SCOTUS decisions. As for "Constitution explicitly states that liberty is to be protected," it explicitly states specific liberties that must be protected. Abortion isn't among those. As for the 14th, the SCOTUS disagreed with your conclusion in Roe. All 9 justices explicitly agreed that the 14th amendment would ban elective abortion if the unborn children were considered to be "persons" for the purposes of the 14th. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 17:36 | comment | added | Acccumulation | "unless one takes the view that the unborn child is a 'person'" The 14th seems to exclude them, as it grants citizenship to all born in the US, and even if they are considered persons, that doesn't mean abortion is banned. First, it would seem to only restrict government action, and second, it's debatable whether the mother's freedom should be subordinated. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 17:36 | comment | added | Acccumulation | "However, the current state of U.S. law is that it is legal under virtually all circumstances" That is not at all correct. Red states have enacted a slew of restrictions. "The U.S. Constitution says exactly nothing about the issue of abortion" The Constitution explicitly states liberty is to be protected. Just because it doesn't exhaustively list everything that one might do with that liberty doesn't mean those things aren't protected. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 4:04 | comment | added | dan04 | Even the late Ruth Bader Ginsberg, a major proponent of legal abortion on demand, lamented that Roe was too sweeping, and therefore created a backlash that wouldn't have been as strong if the issue had been left up to state legislatures. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 2:48 | comment | added | reirab | @MichaelKay Judges aren't supposed to change the law in the U.S., but rather merely ensure that it is applied according to the intent of the law (including according to the intent of laws that might supersede the law being challenged, such as the U.S. Constitution or, in the case of state laws, the state's Constitution or U.S. federal law.) Unfortunately, though, some judges have a very broad view of "interpreting" the law that is more just outright changing it to what they want it to be rather than what it was meant to be. That is widely perceived to be the case with Roe and related cases. | |
| Apr 22, 2022 at 2:45 | comment | added | reirab | @MichaelKay It is also the case in the U.S. that charges would normally not be brought for laws that everyone violates and, if they did, those charges would normally be dismissed. In this case, much of the passion is indeed because the issue was decided by courts rather than the normal legislative processes that previously governed the issue. In particular, the problem is that the ruling is perceived to be simply factually incorrect. U.S. Constitutional law is intended to require very broad consensus to change, but the Constitution does not actually address this issue directly at all. | |
| Apr 21, 2022 at 23:57 | comment | added | Michael Kay | And if the courts did get involved, it would only be to decide whether an individual abortion was legal or not; it couldn't change the law, because a law passed by Parliament cannot (in general) be overturned by the courts. Perhaps some of the passion in the US is because of the process where it's decided by judges who are appointed politically and then serve for life. | |
| Apr 21, 2022 at 23:49 | comment | added | Michael Kay | This raises in my mind a question of whether the real difference is the willingness of the courts to get involved. Many abortions in the UK could be challenged as being illegal; but in most cases the courts would refuse to adjudicate such a challenge because the complainant would have to have locus standi. It's not uncommon in the UK for there to be laws that "everyone" breaks without challenge: the 70mph speed limit is another example. | |
| Apr 21, 2022 at 18:40 | history | edited | reirab | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
fixed typos
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| Apr 21, 2022 at 18:28 | comment | added | dan04 | In theory, the US allows states to ban abortion after “viability”, unless necessary for the woman's “health”. However, Roe v. Wade's companion case Doe v. Bolton, describes “health” such “that the medical judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors - physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman's age - relevant to the well-being of the patient.” This can be interpreted to construe any reason for abortion as a “health” issue. | |
| Apr 21, 2022 at 17:52 | comment | added | Jack Aidley | In the UK, abortion is de facto allowed on demand, although with some degree of hoop jumping. | |
| Apr 21, 2022 at 16:39 | history | answered | reirab | CC BY-SA 4.0 |