Abortion In Michigan

Abortion in Michigan is legal. 54% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

The number of abortion clinics have been declining in recent years, going from 83 in 1982 to 70 in 1992 to twenty in 2014. There were 19,354 legal abortions performed in the state in 2014. Between 1893 and 1932, there were 156 indictments and 40 convictions of women for having abortions. In 2010, the state had seven publicly funded abortions.  There were 27,629 legal abortions in 2014, and 27,151 legal abortions in 2015.  There were 26,594 total abortions performed in Michigan in 2017.

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.

History

Legislative history

By the end of the 1800s, all states in the Union except Louisiana had therapeutic exceptions 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. In 1932, a law was passed that made abortion illegal in the state.

In 2006, the parents of Becky Bell, a girl whose death was related to the existence of parental consent rules, testified before the Michigan House of Representatives in opposition to a pending parental consent law. The state was one of 23 states in 2007 to have a detailed abortion-specific informed consent requirement. Michigan was the only state with a detailed informed consent statue that provided women seeking abortions on the state website with information about pregnancy relative to how far along the woman is. Georgia, Michigan, Arkansas and Idaho all required in 2007 that women must be provided by an abortion clinic with the option to view an image their fetus if an ultrasound is used prior to the abortion taking place. Michigan was the only state 23 with written informed consent materials that did not require abortion providers to give patients information about abortion alternatives.

In 2013, state Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) law applied to medication induced abortions in addition to abortion clinics. The state legislature was one of ten states nationwide that tried to unsuccessfully pass a fetal heartbeat bill in 2018.  Only Iowa successfully passed such a bill, but it was struck down by the courts.

In May 2019, the Republican dominated state Legislature passed HB 4320-4321 and SB 229-230 which banned dilation and evacuation abortions. They specified criminal sentences of two years for anyone who performed this type of abortion procedure. The legislation passed 22 -16 in the Senate and 58 - 51 in the House. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer promised to veto the legislation and any similar legislation attempting to ban abortions in the state. As of May 14, 2019, the state prohibited abortions after the fetus was viable, generally some point between week 24 and 28. This period uses a standard defined by the US Supreme Court in 1973 with the Roe v. Wade ruling.

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.

Clinic history

Number of abortion clinics in Michigan by year.

Between 1982 and 1992, the number of abortion clinics in the state decreased by thirteen, going from 83 in 1982 to 70 in 1992. In 2014, there were twenty abortion clinics in the state. In 2014, 89% of the counties in the state did not have an abortion clinic. That year, 40% of women in the state aged 15 – 44 lived in a county without an abortion clinic. In March 2016, there were 21 Planned Parenthood clinics in the state. In 2017, there were 19 Planned Parenthood clinics in a state with a population of 2,209,248 women aged 15 – 49 of which 8 offered abortion services.

Statistics

Between 1893 and 1932, there were 156 indictments and 40 convictions of women for having abortions. In 1990, 1,157,000 women in the state faced the risk of an unintended pregnancy. In 2010, the state had seven publicly funded abortions, of which were seven federally funded and zero were state funded. In 2013, among white women aged 15–19, there were  abortions 1460, 1700 abortions for black women aged 15–19, 130 abortions for Hispanic women aged 15–19, and 90 abortions for women of all other races. In 2014, 54% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. In 2017, the state had an infant mortality rate of 6.8 deaths per 1,000 live births. In 2017, there were 1,777 dilation and evacuation procedures among the 26,594 total abortions performed in Michigan that year.

Illegal and unsafe abortion deaths

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 2005, the Detroit News reported that a 16-year-old boy beat his pregnant, under-age girlfriend with a bat at her request to abort a fetus. The young couple lived in Michigan, where parental consent is required to receive an abortion.

Abortion rights views and activities

Ann Arbor Women's March in 2017.

Views

Sen. Winnie Brinks, D-Grand Rapids said during a hearing on the 2019 proposed abortion legislation, "Nearly 99% of abortions occur before 21 weeks, but when they are needed later in pregnancy, it is often in very complex circumstances, the kinds of situations where a woman and her doctor need every medical option available. [...] In fact, abortions later in pregnancy often involve rare, severe fetal abnormalities, and serious risks to women's health." Sen. Erika Geiss, D-Taylor said during the same debate, "I can stand here and call out the hypocrisy of predominantly male legislators — most of whom, with zero medical background — who somehow decided when they took office that they are medical experts and experts of women's bodies and health care."

Protests

Women from the state participated in marches supporting abortion rights as part of a #StoptheBans movement in May 2019.

Anti-abortion activities and views

Views

The Democrats for Life of America are a group of anti-abortion Democrats on the political left who advocate for an anti-abortion plank in the Democratic Party's platform and for anti-abortion Democratic candidates. Former vice-presidential candidate Sargent Shriver, the late Robert Casey, a former two-term governor of Pennsylvania, and former Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich), a former leader of the bipartisan anti-abortion caucus in the United States House of Representatives, have been among the most well-known anti-abortion Democrats. However, following his vote in favor of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Marjorie Dannenfelser of the SBA List reported that her organization was revoking an anti-abortion award it had been planning to give to Stupak, and anti-abortion organizations accused Stupak of having betrayed the anti-abortion movement.

Violence

There was an arson attack at an abortion clinic in 1981 in Michigan that caused US$57,000 in damage. On September 11, 2006, David McMenemy of Rochester Hills, Michigan, crashed his car into the Edgerton Women's Care Center in Davenport, Iowa. He then doused the lobby in gasoline and started a fire. McMenemy committed these acts in the belief that the center was performing abortions; however, Edgerton is not an abortion clinic. Time magazine listed the incident in a "Top 10 Inept Terrorist Plots" list.

Footnotes