Carol Tobias, President of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), claims that their post-Roe model abortion law will function to “protect” pregnant people and children in the United States from abortion. Unfortunately, this “protection”- which in reality is nothing short of government control and punishment- comes at a very high price, something which Tobias and the National Right to Life have failed to consider or have willingly chosen to ignore.
As we endure the very real stages of grief that come along with acknowledging and accepting that Roe has in fact been overturned, it is understandable that you may not be interested in reading the twenty-nine-page model law. I am clearly a glutton for punishment who enjoys existing in this grim reality of disappointment and anger, so I did in fact read this model law- every misinformed and careless word of it. Model legislation like this is written by advocacy and special interest groups to be used by lawmakers to craft similar proposed laws in their state. So the language and claims I cover here are likely to start showing up in state laws very soon, if they haven't already
Before we begin the actual analysis of this legislation, it is important to define NRLC’s language specifically relating to “unborn life” - a phrase I will not utilize as it only gives power to the dangerous beliefs of Tobias and her supporters and rejects the evidence-based conclusions of the medical community. This group defines life as beginning at conception. I can absolutely acknowledge that the question of when life begins is personal and incredibly complicated with no existing general consensus. However, I can also affirm that Carol Tobias, other members of the National Right to Life Committee, and American politicians are not the experts when it comes to this discussion. Life and its related characteristics are best left to the scientific and medical community to define, especially when the definition can yield such immense legislative power.
The NRLC describes a twofold approach to legislation aimed at banning abortion: the first portion of this legislation determines which abortions will be prohibited and which will be allowed as well as the conditions under which the law deems these abortions appropriate- shockingly their proposed legislation only allows for an abortion to be performed to prevent the death of a pregnant person but the conditions under which a pregnant person’s life could be deemed adequately at risk are left up for interpretation- and the second portion of their model legislation details an “effective enforcement regime.”
This post-Roe model law provides a very broad legislative definition of when precisely an abortion is necessary, stating that the procedure may only take place if “an attending physician determines based on reasonable medical judgment, that abortion was necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.” What exactly is “reasonable” judgment? Who determines the legitimacy of said judgment? What is an acceptable risk of mortality for the mother? All of these vital questions remain purposefully unanswered throughout the remaining twenty-four pages of proposed legislation; these broad and unspecific definitions of “reasonable” medical judgment allow for local and state policymakers to mold their state’s laws to better align with their personal belief systems and blatantly disregard the expertise and valued judgments of medical professionals.
The ambiguity of these laws often prevents medical professionals from providing abortion care out of fear that they will be prosecuted and punished. In an interview with NPR, Dr. Louise King, an obstetrician and gynecologist at Boston’s Brigham and Women's Hospital, explains that “laws will exist that ask [physicians] to deprioritize the person in front of them and to act in a way that is medically harmful. And the penalty for not doing so will be loss of license, financial penalties, and potentially even criminal sanctions.” Dr. Amy Addante, another ob-gyn interviewed who practices in Illinois, believes that “From a medical malpractice and legal standpoint, I think a lot of health care systems, and even individuals, are going to be very risk averse.” The danger of these laws lies not only in the explicit abortion bans themselves but also in the equivocal language of the bans creating an environment in which medical professionals must make the impossible choice between risking legal punishment such as the loss of their medical license and providing much needed medical care to their patients.
The legislation goes on to claim that it “may be necessary in certain states to have additional exceptions for instances of rape or incest with more detailed language explicitly stating that documentation must be presented to the attending physician that demonstrates that the aforementioned crimes have been properly reported to law enforcement. This legislation goes a step further and declares that the attending physician must then include documentation of the reported crime in the pregnant women’s medical record. This brings to question who specifically will have access to these private medical records and if this post-Roe law intends to maintain the integrity of HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, which guarantees the protection of sensitive patient health information. In broader terms, these laws appear to lay a framework for completely dismantling existing privacy protections for American women creating a space for the direct involvement of government and law enforcement agencies in our private decisions, medical or otherwise.
This legislative document reflects an immense fear that “radical Democrat prosecutors” and other pro-choice policymakers will outright refuse to enforce these restrictive and damaging laws, so they’ve added criminal penalties and civil remedies to address those Americans who refuse to fall in line with their 1960s policies. Section 9 of this model law states that “the [Attorney General], a [Prosecuting Attorney], the father of the “unborn child”, a maternal or paternal grandparent of the unborn child, and a parent or guardian of a pregnant person under the age of 18 may bring legal action against any person for violating or attempting to violate this legislation going so far as to say that they are entitled to “compensatory damages if the person bringing the action has suffered injury or harm from the person’s conduct, including, but not limited to, loss of parental care, custody and companionship of the child and emotional distress.”
Unfortunately NRLC does not believe that emotional distress or psychological damage constitutes a “reasonable” excuse for someone to seek an abortion, explicitly stating that a ‘medical emergency’ means a condition that, in reasonable medical judgment, so complicates the medical condition of the pregnant woman as to necessitate the immediate abortion of her pregnancy to avert her death…not including psychological or emotional condition.” These contradicting subsections of this legislation reflect the very real declaration that damage to a pregnant woman’s mental, emotional, and/or psychological health is not only a non-issue to anti-abortion supporters but that a woman’s emotional and psychological health is irrelevant when compared to that of a man’s. Allowing compensatory damages to be provided to the father of the “unborn child”, for example, due to the emotional distress caused by a pregnant woman violating, attempting to violate, or even threatening to violate this anti-abortion act sends the message that women and the children we bring into this world are a means to a man’s end- it is the father or grandfathers grief, loss, anger, and despair that deserves not only to be acknowledged in the court of public opinion and within the laws of our nation but that it should also be monetarily rewarded.
This dismissal of a women’s mental and emotional health is further supported by Section 12 of this model law in which a “claim or diagnosis that the pregnant woman will engage in conduct that would result in her death” is not a “reasonable” or accepted explanation for a physician to perform an abortion. The National Right to Life Committee would rather force a woman who has clearly expressed distress- either mental or emotional- so severe that she has considered ending her own life to continue with a pregnancy than acknowledge that a woman’s emotions and experiences are not only valid in the face of the law but worthy of support and medical action.
After reading and analyzing all twenty-nine pages of this proposed post-Roe legislation carelessly created by the National Right to Life Committee, it is clear that its goal was never about preserving life or even stopping abortion procedures from occurring, but rather about exercising complete control over women’s bodies. This legislation and its anti-abortion supporters are clearly more concerned with involving the government in women’s medical decisions and eliminating all semblance of bodily autonomy than creating an environment in which life is truly valued and cared for.
I understand how easy it is to allow the overturning of Roe and its related onslaught of restrictive legislation such as the one analyzed above to make you feel as though the fight for bodily autonomy has been lost entirely, but I can assure you that even in the midst of such darkness and grief that this is not the case.
I hope that you allow yourself the time and space to process this defeat and all the emotions that come along with it. I only ask that once you have begun to heal and you can acknowledge – but never accept – the realities of our current abortion climate that you direct your strength and power into something productive. Whether that be voting in November for representatives that will actively fight for your right to make decisions about your own body, sharing your own personal experiences with abortion and inspiring others to do the same, or joining in on protests or marches that take place in the coming months I urge you to do your best to show our nation’s policymakers that the fight for bodily autonomy is far from over and that we will not sit by and allow their attempts to further restrict our freedoms to go unanswered.
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Author: Megan Piller
Megan is a Digital Advocacy and Education Intern for Planned Parenthood pursuing a dual degree in Microbiology and Immunology as well as Public Health at the University of Miami. Find her @megan.piller on Instagram