In October of 2011, a controversial law was repealed in the state of North Carolina, whereby doctors would be required to offer all women seeking abortions the opportunity to see an ultrasound image of the fetus and hear the fetal heartbeat played aloud. According to the law, if the patient declines to see the image of the fetus, the doctor would be required to describe the features of the fetus aloud to her. North Carolina legislators found that the proposed legislation was unconstitutional, as it would in effect intensify the patient's emotional stress during the abortion period, and could even amount to coercion. The proposed legislation, it was found, would also infringe upon the right of the doctor, as it would require them to say and do things that they may be ethically uncomfortable with. Despite this precedent, last Friday, a court of appeals in Texas ruled that the same legislation does not infringe on the personal freedoms of the doctor nor patient, and will be effective immediately. Similar legislation is under discussion in Ohio. Abortion is legal under the Supreme Court's landmark 1973 Roe vs Wade decision, though more minute legislation is left to the individual state. As the campaign for the Republican candidate for this years US presidential election heats up, candidates have attempted to appeal to the vote on the Christian right, competing with one another to prove who is more stridently anti-abortion than the other. Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich was celebrated after promising that he would sign a series of abortion crackdowns two hours after his inauguration. He also vowed to have Congress pass a bill stating that “personhood” begins with conception, equating abortion with murder. Meanwhile, leading candidate Mitt Romney, who is himself an opponent of abortion, has been criticized for his moderate stance on abortion while he was governor of Massachusetts. Romney explains that he “respected the state's democratically held view” to protect abortion rights for women despite his personal convictions. However, as American legislators to appeal to the large Christian constituency in the country, the politics of campaigning could increasingly diminish a woman's right to choose. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/BjPO6 Tags: Abortion, Choice, United States Section: North America, Op-ed, Women
