Abortion In Louisiana
Abortion in Louisiana is legal. Only 39% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. The state had abortion related laws on the books by 1900. A 1997 Louisiana law created a civil cause of action for abortion-related damages, including damage to the unborn, for up to ten years after the abortion. By the mid-2000s, members of the state legislature were trying to roll back 1973's US Supreme Court Roe v. Wade ruling. In mid-2019, the state legislature passed a law that would make abortion illegal in almost all cases. It was one of several states passing such laws in April and May 20, 2019 alongside Georgia, Missouri and Alabama.
The number of abortion clinics in the state has been on the decline in recent years, going from eighteen in 1982 to seventeen in 1992 to five in 2014. There were 10,322 legal abortions in 2014, and 9,362 legal abortions in 2015. There are both abortion rights activists and anti-abortion rights activists in Louisiana.
Terminology
The abortion debate most commonly relates to the "induced abortion" of an embryo or fetus at some point in a pregnancy, which is also how the term is used in a legal sense. Some also use the term "elective abortion", which is used in relation to a claim to an unrestricted right of a woman to an abortion, whether or not she chooses to have one. The term elective abortion or voluntary abortion describes the interruption of pregnancy before viability at the request of the woman, but not for medical reasons.
Anti-abortion advocates tend to use terms such as "unborn baby", "unborn child", or "pre-born child", and see the medical terms "embryo", "zygote", and "fetus" as dehumanizing. Both "pro-choice" and "pro-life" are examples of terms labeled as political framing: they are terms which purposely try to define their philosophies in the best possible light, while by definition attempting to describe their opposition in the worst possible light. "Pro-choice" implies that the alternative viewpoint is "anti-choice", while "pro-life" implies the alternative viewpoint is "pro-death" or "anti-life". The Associated Press encourages journalists to use the terms "abortion rights" and "anti-abortion".
Context
Free birth control correlates to teenage girls having a fewer pregnancies and fewer abortions. A 2014 New England Journal of Medicine study found such a link. At the same time, a 2011 study by Center for Reproductive Rights and Ibis Reproductive Health also found that states with more abortion restrictions have higher rates of maternal death, higher rates of uninsured pregnant women, higher rates of infant and child deaths, higher rates of teen drug and alcohol abuse, and lower rates of cancer screening.
According to a 2017 report from the Center for Reproductive Rights and Ibis Reproductive Health, states that tried to pass additional constraints on a women's ability to access legal abortions had fewer policies supporting women's health, maternal health and children's health. These states also tended to resist expanding Medicaid, family leave, medical leave, and sex education in public schools. According to Megan Donovan, a senior policy manager at the Guttmacher Institute, states have legislation seeking to protect a woman's right to access abortion services have the lowest rates of infant mortality in the United States. In 2017, Georgia, Ohio, Missouri, Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi have among the highest rates of infant mortality in the United States. In 2017, Louisiana had an infant mortality rate of 7.1 infant deaths per 1,000 live births. According to the 2018 America's Health Rankings produced by United Health Foundation, Louisiana ranked 47th in the country when it came to maternal mortality at 44.8 deaths per 100,000 live births. A 2018 March of Dimes report said the preterm birth rate among African American women in Alabama and Louisiana was much higher, 51% higher, than women of all other races in the state.
Poor women in the United States had problems paying for menstrual pads and tampons in 2018 and 2019. Almost two-thirds of American women could not pay for them. These were not available through the federal Women, Infants, and Children Program (WIC). Lack of menstrual supplies has an economic impact on poor women. A study in St. Louis found that 36% had to miss days of work because they lacked adequate menstrual hygiene supplies during their period. This was on top of the fact that many had other menstrual issues including bleeding, cramps and other menstrual induced health issues. This state was one of a majority that taxed essential hygiene products like tampons and menstrual pads as of November 2018.
History
One of the biggest groups of women who oppose legalized abortion in the United States are southern white evangelical Christians. These women voted overwhelming for Trump, with 80% of these voters supporting him at the ballot box in 2016. In November 2018, during US House exit polling, 75% of southern white evangelical Christian women indicated they supported Trump and only 20% said they voted for Democratic candidates.
Legislative history
By the end of the 1800s, Louisiana was the only state to not have a therapeutic exception in their legislative bans on abortions. In the 19th century, bans by state legislatures on abortion were about protecting the life of the mother given the number of deaths caused by abortions; state governments saw themselves as looking out for the lives of their citizens.
A 1997 Louisiana law created a civil cause of action for abortion-related damages, including damage to the unborn, for up to ten years after the abortion. The same law also bars the state's Patient's Compensation Fund, which limits malpractice liability for participating physicians, from insuring against abortion-related claims. An attorney for the Center for Reproductive Rights, which opposes the law, said the law is an attempt to drive abortion providers out of practice, and that every completed abortion imposes strict liability under the law because abortion necessarily involves damage to the unborn.
On June 19, 2006, Governor Kathleen Blanco signed into law a trigger ban on most forms of abortion (unless the life of the mother was in danger or her health would be permanently damaged) once it passed the state legislature. Although she felt exclusions for rape or incest would have "been reasonable," she felt she should not veto based on those reasons. The trigger law would only go into effect if the United States Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade. Louisiana's measure would allow the prosecution of any person who performed or aided in an abortion. The penalties include up to 10 years in prison and a maximum fine of $100,000.
The state passed a law in the 2000s banning abortions before 22 weeks, when it was said that the fetus felt pain. The state was one of 23 states in 2007 to have a detailed abortion-specific informed consent requirement. By law, abortion providers in Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi were required to perform ultrasounds before providing women with ultrasounds, even in situations like in the first trimester where an ultrasound has no medical necessity.
In 2011, the state was one of six where the legislature introduced a bill that would have banned abortion in almost all cases. It did not pass. In 2013, state Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) law applied to private doctor offices in addition to abortion clinics. In 2014, the state passed a law that appeared to require it to maintain a database of women who had abortions in the state, and the type of abortion the woman had. A second law, Act 620, passed in 2014, modeled after one passed earlier in Texas, required that any doctor performing abortions also have admittance privileges at an authorized hospital within a 30-mile radius of the abortion clinic, among other new requirements. At the time the law was passed, only one doctor had this privileges, effectively leaving only one legal abortion clinic in the state. The state had a law on the books in August 2018 that would be triggered if Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Nationally, 2019 was one of the most active years for state legislatures in terms of trying to pass abortion rights restrictions. State governments with Republican majorities started to push these bills after Brett M. Kavanaugh was confirmed as a US Supreme Court judge, replacing the more liberal Anthony M. Kennedy. These state governments generally saw this as a positive sign that new moves to restrict abortion rights would less likely face resistance by the courts. In mid-May 2019, state law banned abortion after week 22. In mid-2019, the state legislature passed a law that would make abortion illegal in almost all cases. It was one of several states passing such laws in April and May 20, 2019 alongside Georgia, Missouri and Alabama. The bill was created as an amendment and before it could become law, it needed to be passed by voters in the state via a referendum. It was an example of a "fetal heartbeat" bill. At the time the bill passed, only 15% of the state legislators were female, but only two female representatives voted against the bill.
In 2020, Louisiana voters passed a measure to amend the state constitution to omit any language implying that a woman has a right to get an abortion or that any abortion that does occur should be funded.
Judicial history
The US Supreme Court's decision in 1973's Roe v. Wade ruling meant the state could no longer regulate abortion in the first trimester.
The model Texas law passed in 2014 was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt in 2016, as the additional admitting privileges required by Texas law interfered with a woman's right to an abortion per Roe v. Wade. While the Texas law was being challenged, the Louisiana law was challenged by abortion clinics and doctors in the state in June Medical Services, LLC v. Gee; while the District Court ordered an injunction on the law, the Fifth Circuit Appeals Court reversed this decision, allowing the law to come in effect later in 2014. The plaintiffs petitioned the Supreme Court, who granted an emergency stay of the Fifth Circuit's order, pending the result of the pending Texas litigation in Whole Woman's Health. June Medical Services was remanded back to District Court, which found the law unconstitutional under Whole Woman's Health. The Fifth Circuit reversed the District's finding and prepared to allow the law to come back into effect by February 4, 2019, differentiating the case from the Texas one as they found the physician had not taken any steps to try to qualify for this allowance. The plaintiffs again petitioned the Supreme Court for an emergency stay of the Fifth Circuit's decision. Justice Samuel Alito granted the stay of the law until February 7, 2019, stating that the Court needed more time to evaluate the request and had made no merits on the ruling of the case. Subsequently, on February 7, 2019, the Supreme Court ruled 5–4, with Justice John Roberts joining the liberal Justices, in reversing the Firth Circuit's order, effectively preventing the law from going into effect.
Clinic history
Between 1982 and 1992, the number of abortion clinics in the state decreased by one, going from eighteen in 1982 to seventeen in 1992. In 2014, there were five abortion clinics in the state. In 2014, 92% of the counties in the state did not have an abortion clinic. That year, 63% of women in the state aged 15 – 44 lived in a county without an abortion clinic. In 2017, there were two Planned Parenthood clinics in a state with a population of 1,089,684 women aged 15 – 49 of which zero offered abortion services. North Dakota, Wyoming, Mississippi, Louisiana and Kentucky were the only five states as of July 21, 2017 not to have a Planned Parenthood clinic that offered abortion services.
Statistics
In the period between 1972 and 1974, the state had an illegal abortion mortality rate per million women aged 15 – 44 of between 0.1 and 0.9. In 1990, 489,000 women in the state faced the risk of an unintended pregnancy. In 2010, the state had zero publicly funded abortions. In 2001, Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and Wisconsin did not provide any residence related data regarding abortions performed in the state to the Centers for Disease Control. In 2013, among white women aged 15–19, there were abortions 290, 640 abortions for black women aged 15–19, zero abortions for Hispanic women aged 15–19, and 60 abortions for women of all other races. In 2014, 39% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.
| Census division and state | Number | Rate | % change 1992–1996 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1992 | 1995 | 1996 | 1992 | 1995 | 1996 | ||
| US Total | 1,528,930 | 1,363,690 | 1,365,730 | 25.9 | 22.9 | 22.9 | –12 |
| West South Central | 127,070 | 119,200 | 120,610 | 19.6 | 18 | 18.1 | –8 |
| Arkansas | 7,130 | 6,010 | 6,200 | 13.5 | 11.1 | 11.4 | –15 |
| Louisiana | 13,600 | 14,820 | 14,740 | 13.4 | 14.7 | 14.7 | 10 |
| Oklahoma | 8,940 | 9,130 | 8,400 | 12.5 | 12.9 | 11.8 | –5 |
| Texas | 97,400 | 89,240 | 91,270 | 23.1 | 20.5 | 20.7 | –10 |
| Location | Residence | Occurrence | % obtained by out-of-state residents |
Year | Ref | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Rate^ | Ratio^^ | No. | Rate^ | Ratio^^ | ||||
| Louisiana | 13,600 | 13.4 | 1992 | ||||||
| Louisiana | 14,820 | 14.7 | 1995 | ||||||
| Louisiana | 14,740 | 14.7 | 1996 | ||||||
| Louisiana | 9,416 | 10.0 | 146 | 10,322 | 10.9 | 160 | 14.1 | 2014 | |
| Louisiana | 8,515 | 9 | 132 | 9,362 | 9.9 | 145 | 14.6 | 2015 | |
| Louisiana | 8,243 | 8.8 | 130 | 8.973 | 9.5 | 142 | 15.4 | 2016 | |
| ^number of abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44; ^^number of abortions per 1,000 live births | |||||||||
Abortion rights views and activities
Protests
Women from the state participated in marches supporting abortion rights as part of a #StoptheBans movement in May 2019.
Anti-abortion rights views and activities
Violence
1998 saw 6 arson attacks, 4 bombings, 1 murder and 19 acid attacks take place at abortion clinics in the United States. The butyric acid attacks took place between May and July in Florida, Louisiana and Texas. On December 12, 2005, Patricia Hughes and Jeremy Dunahoe threw a Molotov cocktail at a clinic in Shreveport. The device missed the building and no damage was caused. In August 2006, Hughes was sentenced to six years in prison, and Dunahoe to one year. Hughes claimed the bomb was a "memorial lamp" for an abortion she had had there.
Footnotes
- ^ According to the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade:
Likewise, Black's Law Dictionary defines abortion as "knowing destruction" or "intentional expulsion or removal".(a) For the stage prior to approximately the end of the first trimester, the abortion decision and its effectuation must be left to the medical judgement of the pregnant woman's attending physician. (b) For the stage subsequent to approximately the end of the first trimester, the State, in promoting its interest in the health of the mother, may, if it chooses, regulate the abortion procedure in ways that are reasonably related to maternal health. (c) For the stage subsequent to viability, the State in promoting its interest in the potentiality of human life may, if it chooses, regulate, and even proscribe, abortion except where it is necessary, in appropriate medical judgement, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother.