Abortion Essay Research Paper January 22 1973

Abortion Essay, Research Paper January 22, 1973 is a historical victory in women s rights and the beginning of one of the largest controversies of the United States. The legalization of abortion by the Supreme Court overturned decades of a woman s right to protect her from unwanted pregnancy. Advocates of the pro-life movement feel as though this judgement allows the murder of innocent human beings for the mother s selfish immoral beliefs. The Pro-life movement also argues that there are many physical and psychological harms that come with abortion. Beliefs of the pro-choice movement are that a woman should have the right to abort a child that is unwanted or comes at a time that the child can’t be taken care of to the best of the parent s abilities. The pro-choice movement

also believes that what a woman does with her body is personal and should not be decided by the government, religious leaders, or people who are not involved in the act. I believe that a woman should have the right to an abortion even if it is not an acceptable practice to many. A woman should have the right to decide when she wants to have a child and she should have options available to her when she becomes pregnant. Although abortion is considered immoral by many in the pro-life movement, I believe like the pro-choice movement that a woman should have the right to decide when she wants to have a child. Pro-life supporters are against abortion because innocent babies are being killed. Their argument is that at conception there is a human being that has a soul. They also believe

that it is unfair to the unborn child to be aborted because the mother feels inconvenienced by pregnancy (Steinnetz 1). Pro-lifers claim that 1.5 million babies are being murdered because of women who have decided to have sex and not want to be responsible for the consequences (Steinnetz 1). Many in the pro-life movement use the Ten Commandments Thou shalt not kill, to prove that abortion goes against the teachings of the Bible. They claim that a fetus is a life and that it should not be destroyed. Pro-lifers believe that women are killing innocent children and going against the teachings of the bible by having an abortion. Pro-lifers also talk about the affect abortion has on the mother. Anti-abortion leaders argue that abortion has many physical and psychological risks that are

not taken seriously by the pro-choice movement. Although legal abortions are safer, women must still deal with the aftermath of the experience. Abortion interrupts the natural process (pregnancy), abortion poses both short-term and long-term risk to the health of the aborted women (Reardon 89). Some of the risks of abortion are severe hemorrhage, infection, embolism (obstruction of a blood vessel by a foreign substance), ripping of the uterus, anesthesia complications, cervical injury, endotoxic shock. Minor risks of abortion are minor infections, bleeding, fevers and chills, chronic abdominal pain, vomiting, weight loss, and painful or disrupted menstrual cycles. Psychological risks of abortion are guilt, shame, fear, loss, anger, resentment, depression, remorse, sexual

dysfunction, deterioration of self-image, and self-punishment. Abortion can also lead women to do drugs, drink excessively, commit suicide, and become more sexually active. Roe v. Wade is the case that began in Texas and ended in the Supreme Court which gave all women the right to have an abortion. Sarah Weddington and Linda Coffee were the lawyers of Jane Roe, a woman in Texas who wanted to abort her child. Weddington and Coffee argued that abortion laws were violating women s constitutional rights (Romaine 26). They suggested that what a women did with her body was an unenumerated right (which is a right that the constitution implies but does not specifically identify) (Romaine 13). Many of the pro-choice movement believe like the two attorneys that women should have the right