Ensuring Access to Abortion at the State Level: Selected Examples and Lessons

Guttmacher Policy Review

Elizabeth Nash^1¹ 

[1]Guttmacher Institute^1

关键词: abortion legality & safety;    adolescents;    confidentiality;    Medicaid;    restrictions;    state policies;    self-abortion;    self-managed abortion;    Hyde Amendment;    proactive policies;   

DOI  :  

学科分类：卫生学

来源: Guttmacher Institute

【 摘 要 】

The October 2018 appointment of Justice Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court has called into question the future of Roe v. Wade and abortion access in the United States. Just one month after Justice Kavanaugh took his seat on the bench, voters in Alabama and West Virginia approved state constitutional amendments intended to allow for additional abortion restrictions or even pave the way for outright bans on abortion in the event Roe is undermined or overturned. 1 Although the changing composition of the Supreme Court has heightened the risks, efforts to restrict abortion are not new. Policymakers hostile to abortion have been working to undermine abortion care since Roe was decided. As a result, access to abortion already looks very different from state to state, and a person’s access to timely, affordable abortion care can be profoundly impacted by her race, socioeconomic status and available resources. As the country looks ahead to a potential future in which the Supreme Court retracts federal protections, states can take stock of their existing policies and consider what is needed to protect or expand access to abortion care. Policymakers in some states have already made progress on this issue, and these examples can serve as a useful starting place—albeit not a sufficient end goal—for shoring up abortion access in supportive states. Affirming and Protecting the Right to Abortion In anticipation of diminished protections at the federal level, states can act to ensure that their own laws and policies affirm and protect the right to abortion. The most robust protection at the state level exists when the right to abortion is safeguarded by the state constitution. According to an analysis by the Center for Reproductive Rights, there are nine states in which the highest state court has interpreted its state constitution to protect the right to abortion (see figure 1). 2 In many of these cases, state constitutional protections have served as greater protection for abortion than the federal constitutional standard. 3 In most cases, however, inserting or establishing new rights under a state constitution is an arduous undertaking that may not be practical or possible. Another option is to enact state statutory protections that—although not as secure as constitutional rights because statutes can be more easily repealed—could help preserve access to abortion in the event that federal protections are reduced. Eight states have adopted laws intended to reflect and affirm the standards established under Roe v. Wade and subsequent U.S. Supreme Court rulings, which protect the right to abortion up to viability and whenever a pregnancy threatens a woman’s life or health. 4 More recently, efforts in a handful of states have shifted focus from the Roe viability framework to a broader model that seeks to prevent the government from interfering in an individual’s ability to access abortion care throughout pregnancy. Most notably, Oregon enacted a new law in 2017 that prohibits the state from interfering with or restricting “the choice of a consenting individual to terminate the individual’s pregnancy”; the law makes clear that this includes interference as a result of “the regulation or provision of benefits, facilities, services or information.” 5

【 授权许可】

Unknown