On Abortion: Why Do So Many Democrats Disdain Democracy?
Pro-Abortion Democrats want to preserve bad law imposed by justices instead of relying on the democratic process - you know, voters their and elected representatives. Why is that?
A favorite podcast is “What the Hell is Going On,” featuring the American Enterprise Institute’s Marc Thiessen and Danielle Pletka. Their most recent podcast featured law professor and former Supreme Court law clerk John Yoo on Roe v. Wade.
It is the best discussion I’ve heard of Justice Samuel Alito’s leaked draft opinion to overturn the Supreme Court’s two abortion-related precedents, Roe and Casey v. Planned Parenthood. If you don’t have time to listen, read the show’s transcript here or “show notes” on Substack.
Thiessen, a friend, is a Washington Post columnist and former speechwriter for President George W. Bush and shares my pro-life view. Pletka and Yoo, as a policy matter, are both “pro-choice.” Yet while they respectfully disagree on policy, they all largely agree with the thrust of Justice Alito’s draft of a majority opinion on the Dobbs vs. Jackson case that Roe v. Wade is “bad law.”
“I don't like it when we are governed by dictators,” Pletka said. “I don't like it when our justices, who really do have extraordinary power in this country if you think about it, I don't like it when they interpret the constitution in ways that are, I think, beyond the scope of the constitution. There's nothing in the constitution about abortion.”
Yoo, who worked at the US Justice Department during the Bush (43) Administration, says it succinctly: “The problem with Roe is that it took that kind of decision away from the voters.” That is where Justice Alito and four other Justices want to return it - to voters and their elected legislators. They could not find the constitutional right to abortion that the late Justice Harry Blackmun and his colleagues found in 1973.
“[Alito’s] main argument, and the problem with Roe, was that the states control most life or death decisions in the country,” Yoo added. “They control the criminal laws, the death penalty, euthanasia, you could go on and on. They control the laws about the family. All these important decisions are in the hands of the states. So why is abortion singled out and taken away from them?”
Many Democrats are responding hysterically, radically, inaccurately, and even violently. After an endless cavalcade of bad political events and news (Afghanistan surrender, inflation, fuel prices, supply chain snafus, etc.), they believe they finally have an issue to generate political support. As Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer falsely opined yesterday on the Senate floor, they think that “For MAGA Republicans, this has always been about making abortion illegal everywhere.”
And some polling does give them hope. TIPP Insights polling shows that abortion has skyrocketed to match inflation as a top issue among Democratic voters. But Democrats, at least in the US Senate, appear to have badly overreached with their ill-advised vote to legalize abortion on demand in all 50 states. All 50 Republicans and Democrat Joe Manchin (D-WV) voted against even considering the bill. This includes two famously pro-choice US Senators, Susan Collins (R-ME) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK).
The “Women’s Health Protection Act” would go beyond Roe and create a right to abortion for any reason during all nine months of pregnancy. It would eviscerate part of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) that exempts professionals from providing services like abortion that violate their faith (think of Catholic and other religiously-affiliated hospitals). Further, it would wipe out limits on abortion that enjoy broad support among the public, such as parental consent and notification laws and bans against sex-section abortion.
How does Schumer’s abortion-on-demand bill play with the public? “The bill would make abortion legal during the pregnancy, up to the moment of birth,” nonpartisan pollster Scott Rasmussen notes. “That extreme position, now embraced by President Joe Biden, is supported by only 17 percent of voters. The vast majority — 72 percent —reject that extreme position.”
That’s not all. “Sixty-five percent of voters think abortion laws should be established by voters and their elected representatives. That’s exactly what will happen if Roe is overturned,” according to Rasmussen.
Schumer and his allies are working overtime to persuade you that overturning Roe v. Wade will not only eliminate a “right” to abortions but also reverse other recent Supreme Court decisions on same-sex marriage (Obergefell), striking down contraception bans (Griswold) and overturning bans on interracial marriage (Loving). They even claim the Lawrence v. Texas ban on laws criminalizing sodomy is in danger. The Biden Administration’s Solicitor General made that point last December when the Dobbs case was heard before the Supreme Court.
Alito’s draft opinion confirms that it is all hogwash.
Democratic gaslighting has had some immediate impact - some people misinterpret what it means to overturn Roe. Rasmussen:
Let’s begin with the reality that any poll asking whether voters want to overturn Roe is meaningless. Why? Because voters don’t know what overturning that decision would mean.
Seventy-seven percent of voters mistakenly think it would make abortion illegal in the United States. Forty-one percent simply don’t know what it would mean (36 percent). Just 22 percent have some understanding of the issue. If people don’t understand what overturning Roe would mean, how can you possibly interpret polling data showing that people don’t want it overturned?
To get a true sense of public opinion, it’s necessary to ask polling questions without D.C. political jargon. When you do that, it becomes clear that most voters will be okay with the result of overturning Roe.
The truth is there for all to see: Justice Alito’s draft opinion makes no policy or moral judgment on abortion as a matter of constitutional law. It returns the matter to the states where it used to reside. Further, Alito’s draft expressly states (page 62) that “Nothing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.” Of course, the final opinion will be the one that matters.
In the same paragraph, he even explained why abortion’s uniqueness is an act that terminates life or potential life. Even the abortion crowd’s second favorite law, Casey v. Planned Parenthood, makes that point. It might help if hysterical Democrats read the draft before commenting on it.
No single court case in the United States is now pending that would upend any aforementioned rights. Not same-sex marriage. Not access to contraception. Not interracial marriages.
Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife, Ginny, must be relieved.
So the question is, why are Democrats so afraid of democratically-elected legislators making this decision? Or rolling up their sleeves and amending the Constitution, the way women did 102 years ago when they won ratification of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution to earn the right to vote. And after Roe is stricken down, at least 16 states have abortion rights enshrined in law or their constitution, including two of our most populous, California and New York, at least to fetal viability outside the womb.
Some states even see opportunity in “abortion tourism.” California is looking to become an “abortion sanctuary state” and help subsidize travel to their state for women living elsewhere to terminate their unborn child. Companies such as Uber, Lyft, Citigroup, Yelp, Amazon, and others offer to help pay their employees to obtain abortions. Don’t be surprised to learn of the development of new, safer “day after” abortion pills and even legislative attempts to make them free. Just like Covid-19 tests. Look for Medicaid and other health care laws to be expanded, although they may run afoul of the Hyde Amendment that prohibits federal taxpayer funding of nearly all elective abortions.
And Canada is happy to take your dollars to terminate your unborn life. It is a lovely place to visit in the summer - both months. Meanwhile, Canadians who pay for their single-payer government health care system with their tax dollars will continue to wait in long lines for elective procedures. Months can turn into years waiting for elective health care in Canada. But Americans clamoring for abortions? Bienvenue! Perhaps Americans seeking “health care” in Canada should be careful attention to what their “health care” system is really doing.
The Democratic left seems quite comfortable turning to a handful of people in black robes, acting as a super legislative tribunal, to advance their agenda, not to mention a growing proclivity to violence instead of relying on due process and the rule of law. Yet it is these same Democrats who complain about an “attack on democracy” when they don’t get their way. “Political action must be taken to right this wrong, and steady our democracy before every right to autonomy crumbles before the Court,” wrote my Democratic State Senator, Adam Ebbin, in a hyperbolic and fear-mongering appeal for contributions to the Virginia Abortion Care Network.
Missing in all this, of course, is the underlying state law that the court was addressing. Mississippi’s law prohibits abortions after 15 weeks of gestation, similar to laws in Europe and other countries worldwide. America joins North Korea and communist China as having the most liberal abortion policies. And most Democrats - about a third of Americans - appear to like it that way.
I guess you really do know people by the company they keep.