It was in 1973 that the United States Supreme Court decided that women had the right to have an abortion until the third trimester of pregnancy, when the fetus would be able to survive on it's own outside the womb.
In the years following Roe vs. Wade, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding abortion rights in the states. States tried to battle the SCOTUS decision by passing all sorts of laws, such as parental and spousal notification laws, laws requiring waiting periods before abortions, and laws requring that women read certain literature before getting the procedure done. The SCOTUS struck down some of these state restrictions on the mid-70s and 80s.
Recently, however, some states have attempted to pass their own restrictions on abortion laws. Oklahoma state senate and house passed a bill that would have made it a felony for anyone who performed an abortion, including doctors. I guess there was a vague exception for abortions in the case that it would preserve the mother's life. The intention of the bill was to attempt to overturn the SCOTUS decision of 1973. The vagueness of the bill is part of the reason Oklahoma's Governor Mary Fallin vetoed the bill, however, she has stated that she is not opposed to re-examining abortion laws in the United States.
As a young woman in the United States, I find bills like this to be absolutely terrifying. My personal views on abortion are beside the point, but I believe the reversing the Roe vs. Wade decision sets feminism back to 1973, and I'm not comfortable with that, or with the fact that old white men are the majority of the people that would be making that decision for me.
When I think about abortion, I don't understand how people can think about the life of the unborn child before the life of the mother at stake. Whether it be that she was raped, is too young, is at risk if she brings the pregnancy to term, or simply does not want to bring a child into the world, that is her choice. People will go to the end of the world to protect their right to own a gun, yet have a hard time understanding a women's right to her own body. The fact of the matter is, abortion is the women's choice. Period. End of story.
Governor Fallin's veto was a win for the feminist movement-- but almost by default. She didn't veto the bill because she's a woman and is fighting for our rights, she vetoed it because she was worried it wouldn't up stand the legal battle. What's scary about that is that it will most likely get revised so that it's more likely to pass-- and when that happens I fear for the state of women's rights in the United States. If a bill like this can pass in one state, it's almost a guarantee that other states will follow.
So, here we are, in 2016, fighting the same battle that we already won in 1973. Hopefully in this case history does repeat itself.
