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Roe and Black Women: 40 Years Later

Posted by: Eleanor Hinton Hoytt on Tuesday, January 22, 2013 at 12:00:00 am

Today, we mark the 40th anniversary of the landmark Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision which set the standard for safe, legalized abortion. Yet for the past 40 years, we have seen continuous and virulent attacks on the fundamental right for women to make a very personal decision--to choose whether or not to have an abortion.  Although that right continues to be debated in Congress and state capitols across the nation, we know that for Black women, access to safe abortion is paramount. But access to abortion services is only a part of our story. The story that also needs to be told is how the road to Roe was paved by Black women’s bodies and by generations of Black women activists who continue today to challenge abortion restrictions.

Yesterday, we commemorated the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., and watched as history unfolded with the second inauguration of President Obama. Both, in their own way, have left an indelible mark on the nation’s landscape. President Obama’s landmark health care reform will transform the way in which women and people of color gain access to health care, including abortion services.

Yet as we have made great strides in basic civil rights that led to Obama's election, we have also seen a corrosion of basic rights for women's reproductive health choices. In fact, in 2012 with 43 provisions in 19 states, we have seen the highest number of restrictions on reproductive rights ever. That is why we must continue to speak out and work to ensure that all women have the right to a safe and legal abortion, when necessary.

We urge President Obama, on this day, to commit to ensuring access to safe abortion services, to increasing access for all women to preventive health care services without additional cost-sharing, and to expanding Medicaid coverage so that more low-income women have the health care they need. We, too, at the Imperative will recommit to a reproductive justice agenda for Black women that goes beyond Roe. Doing so will go far in trusting Black women to make the right decisions for our bodies and our families.

Comments

I don't believe in free unlimited abortions, because abortion is not birth control. I do though firmly believe that abortions should be safe and legal. I do believe that Medicaid coverage makes safe abortion not just a privilege of the wealthy, as was often the case before abortions became legal. Birth control at $7 per pack or $35 per month may be out of the question if your income is limited to $800 for section 8 and $500 in food stamps or still living with your parents and on an allowance for lunch money, with some minimum wage job to make up the difference for whatever cash you need to spend to wash clothes and have toilet paper. Those two subsidies won't even pay for diapers, which would be necessary if you didn't have access to birth control. We can talk all day long about the "choice" of sex, most girls are still coerced into their first time. But also what other options are we providing our children? There are very few and reducing recreation centers, after school programs, the arts and music programs have been decimated, and video games are expensive. So our young people are home alone every afternoon for hours getting fat and or having sex---that's the truth. It's true now and was true in 1979 when I was pregnant at 15 (my daughter is 33), when someone said about my community that the only things to do there were to rollerskate and have sex. Beyond that though the costs to society of unwanted children is almost immeasurable when compared to what I think is a $400 or $500 onetime outlay. The cost of abortion is less than the cost of a lifetime of food stamps and housing subsidy, it's less than the cost of the ridiculously high number of bias-based incarcerations. Crime has gone down since abortion has been available. Those things are just facts and I DON'T believe that people are expendable. I just think the conversation has to be real and to say that other people should live by your moral code as an option to providing a legal and practical service is impractical and a little arrogant.
Posted by: Felecia Studstill on February 3, 2013 at 10:02:00 am
I am black and I am a woman. I as well as my mother have benefited from the pregnancy prevention services of Planned Parenthood. I appreciated the access given. I often struggle with the messages I receive from your site. I am appreciative of information shared because we all must be educated about our health as black women. But on the other hand please be mindful not every black woman holds the same views you share here. I don't know how Roe v Wade has helped the black woman. I really don't know. Are we better off now, then before RoevWade? If so, please show me the data. I am grieved as a 35 year old mother on this "anniversary". I believe that black women need to make behavioral and lifestyle changes. They need to protect their bodies, minds, and souls. I have choices everyday to make. I have values and a belief system to guide my life. I have to be responsible for how we live our lives. The government cannot save us from our own poor choices all the time. After 40 years I think we should strategically focus on abortion prevention. Not being accountable for our own actions is not a legacy to leave with our daughters. My opinion: if you don't wish conceive a child abstain from sexual relations. If you do CHOOSE to have sex, expect to become pregnant. The next generation needs to know the laws of nature.
Posted by: Tamika Miller on January 29, 2013 at 10:22:00 am
As an advocate of Roe v Wade who believes that Medicaid coverage should be expanded to cover abortions as well as increase access to abortion services let me try to explain. I worked as an RN when abortion was illegal throughout the country for most women (women of means always had access to medically performed abortions). I remember the women and girls who were maimed or died because desperation drove them to the back alley abortionists. To say that women 'made the "choice" to have unprotected sex' is to deny the reality of many women's lives. We do not live in a world where women have equal rights or opportunities. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists now recommends that clinicians screen all women and adolescent girls for reproductive and sexual coercion regularly. They note that "coercion can include sabotage of contraceptive methods, pregnancy coercion, and pregnancy pressure". The choice "to not visit their doctor, local clinic or hospital for free to low cost contraceptives" implies that all women know what services are available and have the means to take advantage of them. In rural areas lack of transportation alone is enough to restrict women's access to care. "The cost of abortion is technically expensive for those in the lower" income brackets who do not have health insurance, especially with added the expense of travel, unpaid time off from work, child care for other children, etc. Women with education and financial means sometimes find it difficult to comprehend the reality of these lives. I too believe that "women should control their own body" but before we are "held accountable to various decisions that we make" all women must have the resources to be able to make those decisions.
Posted by: Phyllis Turk on January 29, 2013 at 10:18:00 am
I am quite curious as to why some advocates of RoevWade believe that Medicaid coverage should be expanded to cover abortions as well as increase access to have an abortion across all health care services. As a believer of "women should control their own body" we must also be held accountable to various decisions that we make. The cost of abortion is technically expensive for those in the lower class bracket but some made the "choice" to have unprotected sex, to not visit their doctor, local clinic or hospital for free to low cost contraceptives. Those concepts apply to ALL women. No matter their economic status, you have access to contraceptives, rather it's free or low costs. Yes the laws on abortion should be equal across the nation and not meddled with from state to state but the actually payment of the service...should not be on the shoulders of tax payers nor hospitals, clinics, ect.
Posted by: Tiffany Johnson on January 23, 2013 at 10:32:00 am

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