The Supreme Court’s decision to eliminate the constitutional right to an abortion is a social earthquake. The aftershocks will be felt for decades.
Income inequality will widen as women of means travel to states where abortion is legal and then resume their lives. It’s the women without means who will be trapped in place by their circumstances, only to see their dreams deferred and opportunities lost.
The Republicans can’t stop crowing about what they call a skillfully maneuvered win. They’ll never admit that Roe would still be in place if they hadn’t appointed two radically conservative Supreme Court judges by stealing appointments from Obama and Biden.
We hear promises from these same Republicans that increased social services will be there — to provide family leave, subsidized child care and improved health care. Yet not one Republican senator voted to support President Biden’s Build Back Better bill, which would have delivered those very services.
Nor have state legislatures with Republican majorities been passing bills to provide financial help for those forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term.
In fact, in Texas, which passed a punitive six-week abortion ban last September, we’ve seen the opposite. Its poor population makes do with fewer hospitals and doctors and a very high infant mortality rate.
A radical Supreme Court and fanatic minority have just made life much much harder for many people in this country.
I’m Deborah Booth and that’s my Perspective.
