Most progressives would say the abortion debate is intractable because it reflects the huge gap between conservative Christian and secular humanist values. I'd like to offer another theory, one not incompatible with this one, but a supplement to it. The abortion debate is intractable at this time because the two major political parties in the United States exploit this issue to pursue electoral majorities.

Republicans use the abortion issue to forge coalitions with right-wing and fundamentalist Christian voters. Democrats use it to attract women voters. Neither party will risk modifying its rigid position for fear of alienating the constituencies that the abortion issue has helped attract. Opinion surveys over the past thirty years, however, indicate that the majority of Americans support some abortions as well as some restrictions. Most voters, that is, fall between the positions represented by those who refuse to recognize any problems with the legal status quo and those who want to change it radically. According to a national poll in 2000,


In short, the large majority of voters support the right to choose in the first third of pregnancy and, after that, want access restricted to some cases of hardship, though no one would get this impression from the media or current party politics.

Although the heated atmosphere surrounding abortion politics has been good for Republicans and Democrats, it has not been good for women. Abortion services have become so controversial that women without health insurance, and even many with it, find abortion services inaccessible because of the increasing number of bureaucratic and funding restrictions imposed. Women who live far from major cities face a severe shortage of service providers. Political polarization has not only made abortions inaccessible, it has pushed other important feminist goals to the sidelines: universal child care and preschool, universal health care, paid maternity and parental leave, and better public services for children and adults with special needs.

Keeping the abortion debate heated and polarized doesn't serve women's interests, but it has probably benefited mainstream feminist organizations that grew up around this issue. Rather than trying to forge a public consensus, groups such as NARAL-Pro-Choice America (originally "National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws), the Feminist Majority, the National Organization for Women, and Planned Parenthood have taken a "we won't budge" approach. Any compromise on abortion is represented as a complete loss and the retraction of a fragile right recently acquired. By equating democratic compromise with defeat, these organizations sustain the fear that women will lose all access to abortion; and they also attract more members and funds. For example, the recent ads of the Pro-Choice Public Education Project feature frightening pictures of back-alley abortion rooms, suggesting what could happen if women lose the right to choose. Other ads argue that if a woman's right to choose can be taken away (it is not even clear what this means in legal terms-for example, overturning Roe and then having no states permit abortion for any reason, or something less drastic?), then so can her right to work, vote, and receive an equal education. [2]  Women in the United States, according to this campaign, face the same level of threat to their civil rights from religious extremists as women in Iraq and Afghanistan. Rather than create an atmosphere for a calm discussion of the social and legal requirements for "choice," these ads aim to induce panic-a reaction that will shut down debate and make people unwilling to consider a compromise with their opponents. In this respect, these pro-choice ads are as manipulative as pro-life ads that display pre- and post-abortion fetuses.

The Democratic Party has bought into the "all or nothing" approach to abortion promoted by established feminist groups. Allegedly, this approach draws the women voters who often provide the margin of victory to DP candidates. According to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, "The gender gap in the 2000 presidential race was of the same magnitude as the 11 percentage point gender gap in 1996. . ." This gap remains when researchers control for race and class. A similarly significant gender gap was evident in Senate, House, and gubernatorial races in 2000 [3]  . Not all researchers agree on what accounts for the greater allegiance of women (compared to men of their same race and class) to the DP. Some argue that it is due to the economic insecurity of women relative to men and to women voters' greater acceptance of the role of government in helping those in need. Mainstream feminist groups frequently allege that the gap in voting is due, in large part, to a gap in attitudes on social issues, such as abortion. In 1998, the Feminist Majority claimed that the "abortion issue contributed heavily to the Democratic wins. In California, exit polls showed that abortion was the second most important issue in the U.S. Senate race and the third most important issue in the gubernatorial race in which pro-choice Democrat Gray Davis prevailed over anti-choice Dan Lungren. Winning Democrats such as Schumer, Boxer, and Glendening successfully used the abortion issue to distinguish themselves from their anti-choice opponents in the closing days of the campaign." But some surveys indicate that men and women do not differ significantly in their views on abortion, though they do differ on other social issues, such as gun control. Men and women differ on the importance they attach to "women's issues" in casting their votes, which may explain some electoral outcomes. [4] 

As if taking their cue from mainstream feminist organizations, DP candidates in recent years have defined themselves as staunchly pro-choice. Most recently, the unlikely presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich flipped from pro-life to pro-choice in opening his bid for the DP nomination, and wrote in a letter to the Nation (May 5, 2003), "I believe in upholding the right to choose and will oppose legislation, like the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act, that restricts the rights guaranteed in Roe." This stance may weaken his appeal in Ohio and tarnish his image as principled and honest, but apparently Kucinich believes that it is necessary to be unquestionably pro-choice and pro-Roe to attract Democratic voters. Perhaps he is responding to established feminist groups, which have their greatest influence in the primaries where they can block any candidate who doesn't fully adhere to their key positions.

Despite the fact that survey research shows that men and women do not differ significantly in their views on abortion, and that the majority of American voters support the right to choose in the first trimester but would like to see more restrictions on access in the second, keeping the issues simple and positions polarized benefits both major parties. Abortion has become an easy organizing tool for feminists and the DP and also for anti-feminists and Republicans. And though poor women have not fared well in the post-Roe years, the leaders of mainstream feminist groups, like their counterparts in the DP, are generally not poor. For affluent women, reproductive freedom is less contingent on the availability of publicly funded health care or child care and more dependent on the removal of formal legal constraints on the medical services they choose to buy. In fact, mainstream feminist organizations risk losing members and money if they push hard for unpopular welfare programs that would serve the interests of poor, working- and middle-class women. Instead, by keeping abortion front and center, they maintain a mutually productive relationship with the Democrats.

THE MAINSTREAM news media are also complicit in keeping Americans polarized on the abortion issue. In the establishment media, positions that would give neither party an edge, no matter how reasonable, are not seen as important or relevant to the public debate. The prevailing idea of fairness is to give those representing the views of the two opposing parties a public hearing, while all others are shut out. For example, last January, around the thirtieth anniversary of Roe, the media reported on the push to overturn Roe and the struggle to save it. Arguments from legal scholars, such as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who are critical of some aspects of Roe while still in favor of abortion rights, are rarely heard. With the sides so split and feelings so intense, "Roe-in danger" makes for a good story. The only question after that is, who's likely to win-Republicans or Democrats?

Congressional arguments over the controversial mid-pregnancy abortion procedure D&X (intact dilation and extraction) show that the issues raised by abortion do not neatly divide people into two and only two groups. Some pro-choice Democratic senators voted for what became known as the "Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act." Other pro-choice senators would have voted for it, if various amendments had passed-in particular, an exemption to protect a woman's health and a provision that would give women greater access to birth control and early abortions. Yet the ban was approved by the Senate without these amendments (and, at the time of this writing, was approved by the House and is expected to be signed by Bush). Republicans argued that a health exemption would be too vague and therefore would open up a large loophole. Yet it should be possible to find language restricting this late second-trimester procedure to cases of serious hardship (for example, rape, severe fetal abnormality, significant threat to a woman's physical health) that is not too vague for pro-life legislators, and which many pro-choice legislators would support in exchange for removing some funding and other bureaucratic restrictions on abortions in the early stages of pregnancy.

Some people on the left find it hard to imagine that the pro-life camp would compromise, but it divided on the issue of fetal stem cell research, and could well divide again on second-trimester abortions. Some pro-lifers take the "it's in God's hands" approach and oppose abortions even when there is a serious health threat to the mother or a serious fetal abnormality. Others take an "individual responsibility" approach to sex and pregnancy and tend to be more tolerant of late abortions in some hardship cases-rape, fetal abnormality, complications from cancer or diabetes. The latter group would probably find a way to deal with moderates on the pro-choice side. However, although politics typically involves compromise on divisive issues, few Democrats and Republicans are really interested in compromising on the abortion issue. Unfortunately, both parties keep their marginal constituents happy if they don't compromise, even if women are not better off. In the D&X debate, some Democratic senators raised the standard slippery slope argument-one compromise and it's all downhill. Most Republican senators seem to think they will do better electorally by supporting extreme policies, though more moderate Republicans are worried about possible electoral losses should that view prevail.

Indeed, if Roe were overturned, the Democrats might draw more voters who care about "women's issues," while Republicans would land an important victory and solidify their political base. So for strategic reasons, neither party is interested in introducing moderate policies, which seem to have no electoral value. In the meantime, many women and many feminist goals are shortchanged.

To turn this around, feminist organizations need to realize that, on the abortion question, they have become pawns of larger political forces in this country. By continuing to represent the issues in terms of "Roe or nothing," feminist organizations avoid facing the fact that the Roe decision was problematic in some ways and has failed to advance women's struggle for reproductive rights. Cass Sunstein, a liberal legal scholar who defends abortion rights, puts it this way:


Sunstein reminds us that many of the "pro-life" groups with which we're now all too familiar were launched after Roe, in the intense reaction to the Court's imposition of twenty-eight weeks of "abortion on demand" on the entire country (fetal "viability," the Court's novel criterion for delimiting the period of unrestricted access, was understood in 1973 to occur around twenty-eight weeks; today it is reached in many hospitals around twenty-four weeks). Before Roe, Democrats and progressives were divided between those advocating the reform of existing state statutes criminalizing abortion and those advocating the repeal of all abortion statutes. Roe invalidated abortion laws in all states, essentially handing a victory to the repeal forces. After Roe, the reform movement retreated and the pro-choice movement rose up in response to the pro-life movement. [6] 

It's difficult for progressives to challenge groups such as NARAL-Pro-Choice America, the Pro-Choice Public Education Campaign (an umbrella organization of feminist groups whose slogan is "it's pro-choice or no choice"), and Planned Parenthood (which has launched the "Save Roe" campaign). To criticize the strategies of these groups could play into the hands of extreme right-wing groups that oppose women's access to abortion entirely. Indeed, I would not criticize these groups publicly, if they would permit open debate within their organizations over alternative strategies for winning reproductive freedom for the majority of women. Raising questions about Roe in mainstream feminist groups is considered heretical. The reasoning seems to go like this: if you question the need to uphold every part of Roe then you may not be pro-choice; and if you are not pro-choice you probably oppose abortion; and if you oppose abortion, then you're not really a feminist, so your view can be dismissed. These groups have spent so many years defending Roe against criticisms from the right that they have difficulty understanding criticism from the left. Yet their official line on the abortion question is basically a libertarian one-the less the government has to do with women's reproductive lives the better. But this position does not serve well the interests of women who rely on publicly supported health care programs. When I have had opportunities to engage members of these groups-at conferences, public talks, on my campus, and years ago when I was active in NOW-I find that most activists have accepted a set of unchallenged and unchallengeable dogmas equating Roe, choice, and abortion rights. Yet, the easy acceptance of these dogmas reflects an extremely short historical memory on the abortion question. It seems especially important not to forget the reform statutes that won broad public support via the democratic legislative process in a number of states in the decade leading up to Roe. Given that Roe has not brought closure to the abortion debate, nor has it made safe abortion available to the largest number of women, should we not try to imagine alternative strategies?

IN PARTICULAR, what alternatives might we pursue? First, if the Court takes another abortion case (which it probably will soon, given the approval of the federal ban on D&X and the expected legal challenges), there are various options available to it. The justices could reaffirm the basic doctrines of Roe, as they did in Stenberg v. Carhart (2000), striking down the federal ban as unconstitutional for its failure to allow exceptions to preserve a woman's health. This is the outcome that the pro-choice forces would prefer. The problem with this is that it leaves the country polarized around the issue of nontherapeutic late second-trimester abortions. The Court could also uphold the federal ban on D&X, departing from Roe and Carhart, on the basis of the government's interest in protecting fetal life, even before the stage of viability. This is the outcome that pro-choice groups fear, and rightly so, because the ban includes no exceptions to preserve a woman's health (though it does permit D&X abortions to preserve a woman's life). There is an intermediate option here, one that could be acceptable to reasonable people on both sides. The Court could strike down the ban for its failure to make exceptions in hardship cases and then spell out carefully what would count as a "hardship." The large majority of countries in the world in which abortion is legal do this in regard to second trimester abortions (some even for first trimester abortions). That is, after a period of unrestricted access (usually up to the end of the first trimester), most countries introduce restrictions of one sort or another. Some permit access beyond the initial period for socioeconomic hardships (for example, incest, rape, and indigence); some permit access for mental health reasons, some only for physical health reasons, and some only for serious fetal abnormalities. One possible compromise is to allow abortions for socio-economic and mental health reasons up to the middle of the second trimester and for physical health reasons and serious fetal abnormalities after that point. At the very least, feminists should be considering these legal alternatives, while the Court teeters in the balance.

Pro-choice advocates oppose all such compromises, arguing that they would give doctors and hospitals too much control over decisions that should be made by women. Yet, thirty years after Roe, state legislators, with the broad support of their constituents, have restricted abortion through funding cuts, waiting periods, mandatory counseling, and other measures that have shifted power to the state bureaucracy. It now seems clear that poor and young women would do better with a system that empowers doctors to some degree rather than state bureaucrats (and given that abortion is a medical procedure, there is some justification for giving doctors a role in the decision). Another reason pro-choice Democrats oppose modifying the "abortion on demand until viability" standard is that it would force them to acknowledge some unpleasant truths about D&X abortions. Keeping abortions unrestricted until after viability and then allowing exceptions for broad health reasons, including mental health, avoids their having to endorse abortions for basically eugenic reasons. That is, it's probably safer politically to approve abortions aimed at preserving a woman's mental health than those aimed at destroying a Down Syndrome fetus. A few Democrats alluded to the eugenic aspects of D&X abortion in the congressional debates, but this hot potato was quickly dropped as Democrats tried to achieve the same ends by different means. Although their political calculation may be correct, it is dishonest and dangerous. If D&X abortions are primarily used for eugenic purposes, then both feminists and the public need to debate the acceptability of D&X in cases of fetal abnormalities and the possible alternatives.

ANOTHER COMPROMISE the Court and legislators should consider would be to require public and private health insurers to cover contraception and abortion services in exchange for new restrictions on second-trimester abortions. The Court might argue that if women had both a greater ability to avoid getting pregnant plus unrestricted access to first-trimester abortions, then restricting second-trimester nontherapeutic abortions would not too drastically limit their rights to privacy and equal protection. State restrictions on second-trimester abortion would be constitutional only if states, through the regulation of insurance and drug companies and the development of social welfare programs, guaranteed that women had access to adequate reproductive health care. Moreover, many D&X abortions would be avoided if the government would require health insurers to permit women to choose CVS (chorionic villus sampling) over amniocentesis. CVS can be performed around ten to twelve weeks, while amniocentesis cannot be performed until fifteen to eighteen weeks, with results available around two weeks later.

In his initial draft of the majority opinion in Roe, Justice Harry Blackmun proposed guidelines that would have permitted (though not required) states to restrict nontherapeutic abortions after a twelve-week unrestricted period, and that would have allowed states to decide which hardship exceptions to permit. Blackmun thought that these guidelines would make the Court appear less activist and allow the states to work out some of the most difficult aspects of the abortion issue, through a democratic political process involving negotiation among groups. Blackmun's guidelines were essentially similar to those proposed by the American Bar Association a year earlier. After circulating this draft, he was persuaded by his colleagues on the Court to move the cutoff for unrestricted abortion to the stage of viability. Thirty years after Roe, we can see that this was probably a mistake. Though the Court thought the viability cutoff would gain broad public acceptance, it was wrong. In thirty years, public opinion has not changed very much, with polls still showing that the majority of Americans are tolerant of abortion in the first third of pregnancy and significantly less so after this point. Unfortunately, Roe allowed feminists to avoid the "desirable political activity" (to borrow Sunstein's phrase) of working at the state level to win greater tolerance for various hardship exceptions by educating the public about women's need for abortion in different circumstances. And now we may pay for this avoidance due to the considerable success of the pro-life movement in producing greater grassroots intolerance of abortion.

I WOULD LIKE to think that positive political change on the abortion issue in the United States would come from feminist reproductive rights groups, but I realized several years ago that their leaders were unwilling to jeopardize their power and influence by supporting the issues of poor women. Feminists are not the only progressive activists to splinter when they are offered a real piece of the action and accept it on regressive terms. Many academic feminists bemoan the chasm that has grown between women's studies scholars and mainstream feminist groups, and we blame ourselves for focusing too much on theory and not enough on practice. Although this may be part of the problem, it's not the whole story. The chasm that exists is partly due to the rigidity of intellectual views that limits many established feminist organizations. It is more likely that positive change on the abortion issue could come from within the DP, as it sees the need to reinvent itself. Progressive Democratic candidates who are finding that they can build a broad coalition of voters by addressing universal health care, environmental protection, and international peace and justice issues, may also find that a compromise on abortion policies could serve to unite different groups of voters-for example, liberal Catholics and Protestants and progressive women. In addition, positive political change may also come from international feminist organizations in which women from the South are gaining a voice and redefining feminist agendas. Groups such as Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN), [7]  are reconceptualizing demands for reproductive rights to include political, economic, and sexual rights in ways that would protect the interests of poor women and sexual dissidents. Although international groups seem to have little influence on US policy at the moment, perhaps groups such as DAWN can persuade U.S. feminists to move beyond polarizing electoral politics in defining their agendas.


Laurie Shrage teaches philosophy and women's studies at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. She is the author of Abortion and Social Responsibility: Depolarizing the Debate (Oxford University Press, 2003).

The author would like to thank Susan Seizer, Diana Linden, Susan Castagnetto, Naomi Zack, Dan Segal, and Maxine Phillips and the Dissent editors for their helpful feedback on earlier drafts of this essay.

top  |  print  |  email

FOOTNOTES:

• [1] Alissa J. Rubin, "Americans Narrowing Support for Abortions," Los Angeles Times, June 18, 2000. For a discussion of poll data from thirty years ago, see Judith Blake, "The Abortion Decisions: Judicial Review and Public Opinion," in Abortion : New Directions for Policy Studies, ed. Edward Manier, William Lu, and David Solomon, (University of Notre Dame Press, 1977), pp. 51-82. Clyde Wilcox and Julia Riches argue that public attitudes on abortion are morally nuanced and take into account the gestational age of the fetus and the circumstances of the woman. See, "Pills in the Public's Mind: RU486 and the Framing of the Abortion Issue" (Women & Politics 24:3, 2003).
• [2] The ads of the Pro-choice Public Education Project are online at: http://www.protectchoice.org/media.htm
• [3] See http://www.cawp.rutgers.edu/facts/elections/gg2000.html
• [4] See, for example, http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/DailyNews/gendergap000414.html
• [5] Cass Sunstein, "Homosexuality and the Constitution," in Sex, Preference, and Family, ed. David Estland and Martha Nussbaum (Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 223.
• [6] See Kathy Rudy, Beyond Pro-Life and Pro-Choice: Moral Diversity in the Abortion Debate (Beacon Press, 1996), p. 74. [back to top]
• [7] See their website at: http://www.dawn.org.fj/