By Lynn Wenzel

This article originally appeared in the Union, Tuesday, July 5.

In 1972 I marched for the right to control my own body. We carried signs. We were loud. And we were angry. Then came Roe. And we relaxed, at least for a while. Folded as it was into the larger fight for women’s rights, we took our eyes off the ball in the mistaken belief that Roe was “settled law.” Now we know the dreadful truth.

Yesterday, a young woman in her thirties said with a mystified expression on her face, “I just took it all for granted. It never occurred to me that things would change.” Those of us, battle-scarred and wary, had often warned young women to stay alert. And now, they are shocked. The antis have not rested during this 50-year political project and organizing tool—calling themselves “originalists” they have plotted and planned to remove the personal autonomy of all except white men.

Rights and privileges guaranteed to citizens in the Constitution are mostly covered by the 4^th, 5^th, 9^th and 14^th amendments and include: protection from unreasonable seizures by the government, including the seizure of bodies; being compelled to provide private information about oneself, including pregnancy or its termination; the federal government NOT giving over any rights belonging to citizens, in this case women; and not being deprived of life, liberty or property without due process.

I am no Constitutional scholar, but it seems to me that under those rights women’s bodily autonomy may not be violated in any way. Roe, regardless of how it was decided, has been standing on these amendments, which also led to the protection of the rights of Black, Indigenous, and LGBTQIA+ people. The three Court liberals wrote, “The right Roe and Casey recognized does not stand alone. …the court has linked it for decades to other settled freedoms involving bodily integrity, familial relationships, and procreation…in turn, those rights led…to rights of same-sex intimacy and marriage. They are all part of the same constitutional fabric.” Justice Thomas, in his opinion, took aim at three other landmark cases that relied on that reasoning: Lawrence v. Texas, invalidating sodomy laws, Griswold v. Connecticut, declaring married couples’ right to contraception, and Obergefell v. Hodges, establishing the right of gay couples to marry. Justice Thomas has now said the quiet part aloud—the end of Roe is the beginning of the end of all other personal rights.

Justice Alito based his “most convincing” arguments for banning abortion on the work of Sir Matthew Hale, a 17^th century English jurist whom Alito called “a great and eminent” legal authority. Really? Hale detested women, despairing of those who “learn to be bold” or “talk loud,” accusing them of faking rape and proposing the legal notion that women cannot be raped by their husbands. In 1662, Hale also presided at a witch trial, instructing the jury that “witches were real.” He then sentenced two women to hang. Hale considered women should temper their wit and spirit, writing that young women “make it their business [life] to paint…their faces, curl their locks and to find out the newest and costliest fashions.” Alito’s leaking contempt has wet the paper he wrote upon.

Alito claims historical precedent for his position, but contraception and abortion have been widely accepted practices for thousands of years. Ancient communities used sponges soaked in lemon juice or the seeds of Queen Anne’s Lace to block progesterone rendering the uterus incapable of holding on to the fetus. The Navajo and Shoshone women used Western Stoneseed and False Hellebore that caused sterility. Dong Quai catalyzed uterine contractions and induced miscarriage.

For now, women who live in blue states such as ours, are safe. But, as the Washington Post recently reported, anti-abortion groups and their congressional allies are already planning for a nationwide abortion ban if Republicans take power. In an interview with USA Today, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said a national abortion ban was “possible” and “worthy of debate.” Thinking of getting around it by ordering pills that now account for more than half of U. S. abortions? Think again. States are already cracking down on mail-order. Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed a law that criminalizes mail-order abortion pills, fining anyone who sends pills “via courier, delivery or mail service up to $50,000.” Other states have already banned the use of telemedicine.

History tells us that women will not stop ending their pregnancies no matter what laws are in place, no matter the price, even unto death. In Texas, for example, a 2020 study found that local women were three times more likely than those in other states to try do-it-yourself abortion, including using herbs. A 2021 study revealed that some American women are using herbs to self-manage abortions. The conservatives on the court will not be able to render women invisible in their need. They will simply make life more dangerous and deadly for wives, mothers, sisters, and friends. Perhaps that is their goal. Shall we let a small group of men (and one woman) take autonomy and freedom away from us—men whose justifications rest on the words of medieval witch hunters. Vigilance requires us to name their end game—the erasure of all personal rights.

A bitter Clarence Thomas, resentful of media coverage during his confirmation hearing, told his law clerks that he intended to serve on the court to make the lives of liberals “miserable” for 43 years. What an estimable and honorable goal for this antediluvian specimen. Maureen Dowd wrote in The New York Times on May 8, “Alito is a familiar type in American literature; the holier-than-thou preacher, so overzealous in his attempts to rein in female sexuality and slap on a scarlet letter that one suspects he must be hiding some dark yearnings of his own.”

 

MS. More Than A Magazine, A Movement, 5/27/2022, by Aletha Y, Akers

 

I read the draft decision by the Supreme Court in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and wondered what my ancestors would think of us—the U.S.—at this moment. I knew immediately what one might think. Her name is Lillie and her story motivates my work as an obstetrician-gynecologist and as an advocate for sexual and reproductive rights globally. She would say that history is repeating itself after learning little from its past.

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Great article by Sophie Novack in The Washington Post 5/15/22

Kathaleen Pittman, director of Hope Medical Group for Women in Shreveport, La., is relishing what feels like a moment of quiet, despite the drilling outside her office. On this Friday afternoon in mid-March, workers are replacing some of the abortion clinic’s phones, leaving hers briefly disconnected. Since Texas implemented a near-total ban on abortions last fall, the lines have been flooded with calls. “Our phones are literally worn out,” Pittman says.

Before Texas’s ban, she tells me, patients could call Hope Medical and get an appointment the same week for the state-mandated first consultation, and often come back the next day for the procedure. Now, it’s typically a two-week wait just for a call back to schedule a first visit, and a couple more weeks before patients can have an abortion. Pittman showed me a red clipboard with the waiting list of people who have called in the past 10 days. The stack of pages with names; phone numbers; how far along they are in pregnancy, if known; age and parents’ contact information, if they are a minor, is an inch thick.

This spring, I drove to clinics in Louisiana and Arkansas, tracing paths that many of the thousands of Texans who have left the state for an abortion in recent months have traveled and speaking to patients about the obstacles they have faced along the way. The abortion clinic in Shreveport, a 5½-hour drive, is the closest to my home in Central Texas that still offers abortions past about six weeks, which is before most people even know they’re pregnant. Little Rock — home to the two abortion clinics in Arkansas — is an eight-hour drive one way. Both states require two in-person visits, 24 and 72 hours apart, respectively, which means many patients must make the journey twice.

The stories that follow are snapshots from this moment. Texas women shared them with me in interviews inside the clinic during first consultation visits in Shreveport, in a car on the way to the clinic for a procedure in Little Rock, over the phone after finally having an abortion following weeks or months of waiting.

They’re also a glimpse into what will likely be a far more common and widespread reality very soon. If a similar version of the draft opinion leaked in early May holds, and the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade as expected, access to legal abortion would disappear in much of the Midwest and across the South, from Texas to the eastern edge of the United States. About half of states would likely ban abortion in the ruling’s wake; Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and 10 other states, have “trigger” laws that would ban the procedure almost immediately. As a result, more patients would end up traveling farther and waiting longer. These stories explore what that means — for mental health, for family, for work, for daily life in innumerous, interconnected ways. These are patients’ experiences, in their own words. Some women requested partial anonymity to protect their privacy. In the case of the woman who requested full anonymity, her OB/GYN, Crystal Berry-Roberts, who does not perform elective abortions but treated the woman after her procedure, confirmed her story.

Interviews have been edited and condensed.

I found out I was pregnant when I was about five weeks, and it was around six weeks when I started calling and calling. By the time I got [scheduled], they told me I was too far [along] to get the appointment in Texas at all. I got put on a waiting list here [at Hope Medical Group in Shreveport]. It took longer than two weeks. I had to wait and look for the area code to call me. You can’t miss this call.

I’m 12½ or 13 weeks. The GPS told me I was going to run into a crash, and I was going to get here late. I start panicking, trying to call while I’m driving to the clinic. You feel like all your decisions are just based on this law that put you in this time crunch. It’s painful because it’s already a hard choice. Knowing the baby is growing, being forced to keep pushing it along, and going through all these obstacles — it’s a little traumatizing.

I have five kids. My youngest is 4. Since I had her, I’ve been going through a custody case. I’m just trying to not make any more decisions, especially something financially, that’s going to hurt them.

I had an abortion about three years ago. But it was different because I didn’t have to be forced to get attached to the baby. I was able to make a decision and have it done. It wasn’t like being backed into a corner, feeling nervous and scared every day.

It’s affected my time with my kids. I can’t explain it to them, but they know something is going on. At times I think they’re scared that I’m sick or something. I keep making up all these excuses why I don’t have the energy or don’t eat with them, because I feel so nauseous. Going through the longer process and being depressed at times, ’cause you got to think about it for longer and longer — just trying to hide all of that from everybody who I care about, so they don’t take on those feelings. Especially my kids.

I found out that I was pregnant in the beginning of February. I knew [an abortion] was going to be expensive, that I was going to have to jump through all these hoops and hurdles. I was worried, you know: Am I going to get in trouble because of this abortion law? Am I going to get sued?

I was on a wait list [at Hope Medical Group] for like two weeks, and they finally set my appointment for March 4th. We drove four hours, booked a hotel. Friday morning, I had my consultation appointment. Then they tell me that I have to come back for the surgery. So we had to drive four hours back home, wait till the next Saturday to drive all the way back. It was a little hectic and stressful.

Thankfully, I’d just gotten my tax returns, so we were able to take care of everything financially. It was at least $1,000. If we hadn’t gotten our taxes, or if this was a later time in the year, we may not have even been able to do this. I don’t have health insurance. I couldn’t go to a real OB/GYN. Our Planned Parenthood is actually shut down. [My hometown] has one of those [crisis pregnancy centers] where you walk in and they try to tell you that abortion is bad, you know, God made this choice for you, and all that stuff. But they were able to give me an ultrasound and tell me how far along I was before we went all the way to Louisiana.

I was waking up every morning throwing up, couldn’t really eat, just dealing with all this stuff, while trying to take care of my [3-year-old son]. I dreaded every day, just waiting for that phone call [to get off the wait list]. It was awful. Like, please call me, please call me. Because the longer I wait, every day that goes by, I lose another day of my chance of getting an abortion.

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