
 The United States has long been viewed as being one of the greatest, if not the greatest, countries in the world. Individuals from various countries migrate to this country on a continuous basis hoping to attain freedoms such as speech and the press that are inscribed in the United States’ Constitution and define this country as a democracy. However, in recent years, the United States’ role as a country that promises these rights has started to become tainted, as many issues have arose as the result of a lack of clear difference between what rights should be determined by the government and which ones should be left up to an American citizen to decide for themselves. Deciding what rights a woman should have to her own body in particular has sparked an ongoing debate in whether abortion should remain legal or become illegal once again in the United States. This is an issue that has presumed for a myriad of years since the court case Roe vs. Wade in 1973, a turning point that allowed abortions to be conducted legally at each states’ discretion. Since then, a multitude of conservative lawmakers from several states, mostly from the Republican or Grand Old Party (GOP), have been implementing a wide array of restrictions in order for it to be harder and harder for a woman to access one. With the recent election of Republican Donald Trump to the United States presidency in January of 2017, it appears this will only continue, as Trump has vowed to cut funding to Planned Parenthood, a clinic that not only performs abortions, but also provides contraception and vital information about women’s sexual health. Evidently a lot has progressed since the first major step in abortion reform that took place in the early 1970s, but there is a clear lack of understanding by American politicians and a vast amount of the American public about what the federal and state governments hold the authority to create laws about. A government deciding what a woman can and cannot do with her body, especially when this is decided upon by a far greater number of male than female politicians, does not only make American politics appear tone deaf, but also does not adhere to the promise of freedom that this country aims to portray. There is no evidence in recent years of any legislation being made or passed that had the goal of restricting an American man’s access to any form of healthcare. How is it fair, then, that men are making and passing laws that restrict American women from obtaining a type of healthcare they may need? It is imperative that abortion remains legal in the United States despite the efforts from conservative lawmakers and President Trump to restrict a woman’s opportunity to attain one. Not only does making abortion illegal once again cause the conduction of illegal abortions to take place, which have been shown to produce extremely negative consequences for a woman and her body, but will also project the idea that men, and the legislation they curate, make all the decisions for women regarding their bodies. This in turn will render women without the freedom to choose for themselves. In a country that prides itself on the ideals of freedom and individualism, and preaches these ideals through its Constitution, having men speak for women can only bear harmful effects for future generations to come, effects that are already being seen in society today.

Politicians across the United States, as well as citizens, hold a multitude of personal opinions towards abortion, which has caused this issue to be highly controversial in American politics for an immense amount of time.  It has been found through a Statista poll conducted in May of 2016 that about “44% of Americans are pro-choice and 50% are pro-life” (Gallup.com). The closeness of these numbers greatly attributes to the ongoing debate that surrounds abortion today. Those who hold a pro-life stance state that this is due to the religious beliefs they hold or because they view the killing of an unborn fetus to be morally wrong. They claim that every individual, whether born or unborn, has a right to live, some say granted to them by God. Americans who are pro-life argue that carrying out an abortion is the equivalent to murder as a fetus is being killed; they identify the worst aspect of this as being that the fetus is just that, deeming it voiceless and unable to protect itself from this harm. Conservatives in the Republican party have a history of adopting this attitude towards this issue; they claim that abortion should not be legal, as a “unborn child, like any other individual in this country, has an individual right to life that should not be infringed upon by others” (republicanviews.org). As a result, even with the implementation of Roe vs. Wade that has withstood opposing legislation for several years, conservative Republicans have been trying to overturn this legislation by creating a number of restrictions in the hopes of hindering a woman’s efforts to obtain one; “as of 2015, conservative lawmakers considered nearly 400 bills to limit a woman’s access to legal abortion and passed 47 new restrictions” (Chusid). This is shown in the case of Republican state representative of Oklahoma Justin Humphrey, who proposed a bill that would require a woman to obtain written permission from the father of the child before being allowed to get an abortion, or in other words, giving the man the power to decide what the woman could and could not do with her own body. Even more startling than his proposal was his explanation for it, as he entirely denounces a woman of the rights to her own body when he states “I understand that they feel like it is their body. I feel like it is a separate-what I call them is, you’re a ‘host’. And you know when you enter a relationship you’re going to be that host and so, you know, if you pre-know that then take all precautions and don’t get pregnant” (Somashekar). Humphrey’s reference to women as a host exemplifies the view of women by males and a great number of conservative Republican politicians: that women are just viewed for their bodies. Calling a woman a host is demeaning, as it does not give credit for things outside of her body that the woman may possess, such as her intelligence. Not only that, but Humphrey and many other conservative male politicians are in other words saying that if a “host” becomes pregnant but cannot care for the child due to issues that are personal to her, such as lack of financial stability, she is deemed irresponsible and a failure as a “host” if she chooses to obtain an abortion. The reasons behind what a woman chooses to do with her body should not be judged by anyone, nonetheless a man. More importantly, they should not be decided upon by a man. Sadly, “less than 20% of the seats in both the United States Congress and House of Representatives today are held by women” (cawp.rutgers.edu). These two major law-making bodies have been ruled by predominately men since their creation and continue to be ruled by men, resulting in men making a majority of the legislature that is passed. Thus, the beliefs of men are being pressed upon the American public to follow. It is only right for women to have their own say in the issues that impact their lives, especially if they are the single group of the American population impacted, not men. This lack of understanding by men across the country is set to only harm the female youth of this nation; if men are the ones telling women what they can and cannot do, especially when it is in regards to something as sensitive and important to them as their bodies, how will this make the female youth of this nation feel about themselves? Young girls and women, because of these restrictions on abortion that are being decided for them by men, are made to feel as if, in the eyes of men, the only important characteristic about them is their bodies and more specifically, how they look. This can be seen in the recent presidential election between Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton; after winning a great number of Midwest states in the primaries, many men, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough in particular, mocked Hilary for not looking happy and not smiling for the camera. Although her not smiling seems like a non-issue, this has a much deeper message, as no man found it alarming that Donald Trump did not smile in certain aspects of the election. This paints an exemplary example of how woman are just looked at for their bodies, rather than the skills they may possess; men making remarks about Hilary not smiling “turns a simple gesture into something sexual. Instead of asking a woman how she actually feels or being open minded to the idea she might not be interested, there are men that will berate a woman into doing something that she isn’t comfortable doing” (Hardison).  It would be a generalization to say that all American men think of or view woman in this manner, but it is important to address this issue, as it goes so much deeper than just woman being restricted from obtaining an abortion they may need. A wide array of issues has cropped up in the lives of young women as a result of men oversexualizing their bodies, and if this continues, women will be made to feel as if they are incompetent when compared to men and not worthy in American society. 

Although abortion has long been viewed as a shameful and morally wrong act by conservative Republican politicians and Americans who hold pro-life views, the conduction of illegal abortions that women who wish to terminate their pregnancy would be forced to seek would be a worse alternative for a woman to undergo. In an uncovered testimony given by Dr. Michael Levi in 1974, he predicted that “19,830,000 women each year will suffer death and complications because of illegal abortions” (Vagianos). Although this testimony was given in 1974, deeming it outdated in today’s current discussion on abortion, the message derived from it remains true and relevant when deciding whether abortion should be legal or illegal in the United States. The World Health Organization (WHO) has stated that as of 2014 in the United States, “the death rate from abortion is extremely low: 0.6 per 100,000 procedures” (ourbodiesourselves.org). Abortion is now deemed as being one of the safest and most commonly-practiced procedures in the United States, as yearly about “1.2 million American women seek an abortion to end a pregnancy” (ourbodiesourselves.org).  This was not the case prior to the creation of Roe vs. Wade, a time when underground, illegal abortions were a woman’s sole resort if she wanted to terminate her pregnancy. These carried with them a high degree of risk; they were at many times not performed by a certified doctor in a sanitary environment, as the medical licenses of doctors were once threatened to be taken away if they were found to be performing abortions. As a result of undergoing an illegal abortion, women suffered from complications such as cervical cancer, uterine perforation, excessive bleeding from a damaged placenta that rendered future pregnancies to not be an option for the woman, and most common, death. Illegal abortions were performed at around or after 13 weeks gestation, and today, legal, safe abortions are conducted in a pregnant woman’s first trimester, or before 10 weeks gestation. Although safe abortion clinics such as Planned Parenthood have been created in the United States, because of lawmakers from conservative states, women are restricted from obtaining an abortion from these types of clinics, making the illegal abortions of the past seemingly a present choice for women today. In the conservative state of Mississippi, where one sole abortion clinic exists after the amount of restrictions passed to end the conduction of them, it has been found that a woman’s interest in a coat hanger, or self-induced, abortion is greater when compared to women who reside in states where they have less restrictions and a handful of abortion clinics exist. This was found through a March 2016 study conducted by the Guttmacher Institute, where they tracked the word “home abortion methods” searched by women in the United States through the engine Google. They found that in states where lawmakers had a very hostile approach to abortion, therefore those that implemented 10 or more restrictions, there was a high interest in self-induced abortions found through these Google searches. In total in the United States in 2016, they found that there were about 700,000 searches that included interest regarding self-induced abortions, “160,000 asking how to get abortion pills through unofficial channels-searches like ‘buy abortion pills online’ and ‘free abortion pills’” (Stephens-Davidowitz). The immense number of searches conducted in the United States about this topic is extremely unsettling, especially considering the majority of these searches were found to be from women who lived in states where they were heavily restricted from garnering access to an abortion. Therefore, due to these restrictions, they viewed either doing an abortion themselves or ordering “abortion pills” from a website that is not reputable in any sense as their sole options. In a country as industrialized and advanced in terms of medicine such as the United States, how can these searches, which can also be seen as cries of desperation from American women, be happening? If this happened in a third-world country, where little access to healthcare exists, this would sadly be looked at as not as shocking. This is a reality today that must be addressed by both the American public and American lawmakers. Women being made to feel as if their only outlet is to either suffer harm from an illegal abortion or an abortion they conduct themselves was an occurrence prior to Roe vs. Wade, but if change does not come through the creation of new legislation, it will once again happen, and millions of women will once again die due to a lack of understanding by politicians. 

The argument regarding abortion has existed in the United States for a countless number of years, and sadly, when one views the state of American society today, it appears as if this argument will only presume and even worsen, as the vital legislation American women desperately need is not being created or passed. Although the passing of Roe vs. Wade made abortion legal in the United States on each state’s own terms, it has come with a number of restrictions being passed by conservative American lawmakers that greatly impede a woman’s ability to access an abortion. In a number of conservative states, such as Mississippi, one abortion clinic exists as the result of these restrictions being passed. This has led to the illegal abortions that occurred prior to 1973 being a reality once again, as it has been found that women in the United States today have been resulting to coat hanger abortions in order to end their own pregnancies themselves, as the safe abortions they need are not being made available to them. With these types of abortions come a great number of complications that were once felt by American women in the past, most namely death. The United States is undoubtedly one of the greatest countries in the world when compared to other countries, where citizens do not even have access to the freedoms that this country offers for its citizens. However, with this particular reputation comes a great degree of responsibility, as the United States must always ensure that its citizens feel as if they always have access to these rights. It is evident that the women in this country who wish to terminate their pregnancy for their own personal reasons cannot attest to this, as men have, for a great number of years, been creating the legislation that is shaping their lives, especially by creating legislation that pertains to their bodies. A woman’s body is something a man in particular should not hold the rights to make any laws about, as this promotes the idea that men hold the power over women. This idea is detrimental to the female youth of the United States, which can already be seen in society today, as young girls are filled with a great number of issues due to men oversexualizing their bodies. It is only right that the United States, in order to accurately extend the freedoms it offers in its Constitution to all citizens, ensures that abortion will remain legal in the United States, as this will equip all American women with a choice in regards to their bodies and make them feel as if they always have a voice in American politics. 
