# Nearly All Abortions after 6 Weeks of Pregnancy to Be Banned in Iowa **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 4, 2018, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603 "2018-05-04T21:57:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/21 "2018-05-06T12:48:23Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I don’t think you’ll ever see Roe overturned. It would be political suicide if the Republicans succeeded. Enough women would oppose an overturn that the voting shift would end the GOP… I don’t know that there’s a huge difference among men and women on this subject. See here: > **[Public Opinion on Abortion](https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/)** > > While public support for legal abortion has fluctuated some in two decades of polling, it has remained relatively stable over the past five years. If you look at the gender breakdown, 59% women want it legal in almost all cases, vs. 55% of men. Is that difference even statistically significant? If so, it’s probably not that significant. I used to think it would be politically difficult for Republicans if Roe were to be overturned, just because it takes away a rallying cry. However, even after Heller guaranteed a personal right to bear arms, the 2nd Amendment is still a powerful rallying cry, so I don’t see why overturning Roe would remove that. The cry would go from overturning Roe to keeping the progress or putting in more and more restrictions in states where abortion were still legal. If this law makes its way up to the Supreme Court and Kennedy were to die or retire and be replaced by Gorsuch II, I don’t see how Roe stays in place. ---
**Author:** ![Delicious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@Delicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Delicious)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/22 "2018-05-06T14:22:28Z")
> [@DummyGladHands](#): > > And apparently AZ is looking at a law that says if you want an abortion, you have to declare why. > > Idiocy abounds Is there a list of approved reasons or can you just say you’re feeling a bit aborty today? ---
**Author:** ![skyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/54ee81/32.png) [@skyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/skyr)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/23 "2018-05-06T15:04:08Z")
I actually suspect the REAL purpose of this type of bill is in fact to help raise public awareness of things like when fetal heartbeat can be detected (as noted here, some of the people on this thread didn’t even realize that the heartbeat can be detected at 6 weeks). The people who passed this bill know that it WILL be held up in court and not actually go into effect. Remember the pro-life slogan “Abortion stops a beating heart”? They’re trying to get you to think about that. I find it really interesting that most people have a strong opinion on abortion WITHOUT knowing really basic facts like this. **"I have no idea what a fetus actually looks like at different stages of development or what the different methods of performing abortions involve, but, nonetheless, I am SURE that only a crazy lunatic would object to it!"** I think it’s also worth pointing out that very few European countries allow abortion on demand beyond the first trimester like America does. Abortion advocates always act like the sky is falling anytime someone tries to restrict abortion here, but to my knowledge, few people in Europe are freaking out over the fact that France, Germany, Italy and Spain don’t allow you to get abortions after 12 weeks, unlike in America where abortion is available until 24 weeks in many states (and in some states like New Mexico you can get abortions even later than that, even though babies that age would be able to survive if born). ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/24 "2018-05-06T17:02:13Z")
> [@skyr](#): > > I think it’s also worth pointing out that very few European countries allow abortion on demand beyond the first trimester like America does. Abortion advocates always act like the sky is falling anytime someone tries to restrict abortion here, but to my knowledge, few people in Europe are freaking out over the fact that France, Germany, Italy and Spain don’t allow you to get abortions after 12 weeks, unlike in America where abortion is available until 24 weeks in many states (and in some states like New Mexico you can get abortions even later than that, even though babies that age would be able to survive if born). I agree that most Americans are probably ignorant of that fact. I’ve brought that up here a few times as it seems common to think of the US as overly religious and Europeans being more enlightened and secular. But… does a woman really have a difficult time getting a post-1st trimester abortion in a country like Germany or France or the UK? That is to say, the law may say one thing, but is there actually an enforcement mechanism in place? I honestly don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![nelliebly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nelliebly/32/5422_2.png) [@nelliebly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nelliebly)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/25 "2018-05-06T18:20:20Z")
> [@skyr](#): > > I actually suspect the REAL purpose of this type of bill is in fact to help raise public awareness of things like when fetal heartbeat can be detected (as noted here, some of the people on this thread didn’t even realize that the heartbeat can be detected at 6 weeks). The people who passed this bill know that it WILL be held up in court and not actually go into effect. Remember the pro-life slogan “Abortion stops a beating heart”? They’re trying to get you to think about that. > I. I respectfully disagree that the point of passage of this law is to raise awareness as to when a fetal heartbeat can be detected. First, the BILL is about detection, but most Right to Lifers want people to know when the fetal heart starts beating, not merely when it can be detected. In case you didn’t realize when that is, it’s about 22 days after conception. If the law were intended merely to raise awareness, you can bet it’d focus on that 22 day mark. And the law’s supporters clearly don’t share your conviction that the law will be held up in court. From the [New York TImes](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/02/us/iowa-abortion-law-bill.html) [bolding mine]: > [@](#): > > But the Republicans pressing the Iowa legislation are making a decisive turn away from the smaller, more incremental measures of the past that have, in their view, merely chipped away at abortion rights. **They have a new, longer-term goal in their sights: reaching a Supreme Court that could shift in composition with a Republican president in the White House, potentially giving the anti-abortion movement a court more sympathetic to its goal of overturning Roe v. Wade than the current court is.** > > “We at the state legislatures, especially Republican-controlled legislatures, have a responsibility to kind of reload,” said State Senator Rick Bertrand, a Republican from Sioux City. “We need to create vehicles that will allow the Supreme Court possibly to reach back and take this case, and to take up an anti-abortion case.” There are many ways to raise public awareness. This law clearly wasn’t passed to be another one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/26 "2018-05-06T22:09:19Z")
> [@PastTense](#): > > Dr. Paprika: The Iowa legislation defines the cutoff of as the point when the doctor can hear the fetal heartbeat; I put 6 weeks in the title because many people, including myself, don’t know when this usually occurs. So also good economic news for Iowa doctors who are hard of hearing! ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/27 "2018-05-06T22:33:42Z")
I’ve never understood the emphasis on heartbeats to begin with. Dick Cheney doesn’t have a heartbeat, but nobody denies that he’s a person, with all of the rights that go along with that. But on the other hand, you can keep a patient’s heart beating long after brain death, when they’re no longer a person. Personhood is based on brain phenomena, and so if you’re going to be passing laws like this, they should be based on milestones of brain development. Or, if that’s impractical, find out what number of days corresponds to that milestone, and make the law that number of days. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2018, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/28 "2018-05-06T22:37:39Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > While I am pro-choice and I would like to see more gun control, I think this is a weak argument. Like it or not, the Second Amendment exists and creates an explicit right to own firearms. There is no such equivalent for abortions. 1st Amendment. Just because Mahendra believes that cows are loved by Krishna and it is just as bad to kill one as to murder your neighbor, doesn’t mean that Mahendra and 160 million other Indians who have immigrated into the USA can vote for the government to create a law banning steak. Just because Kyoko believes that we are all reborn as different animals on our path towards nirvana, and so it is just as bad to kill a grasshopper as it is to kill your great-grandfather - since the grasshopper may well **be** your great-grandfather - doesn’t mean that Hollywood and all of the other Buddhists in the state of California can establish a law mandating that everyone else has to be a vegetarian. (Fish are okay - they’re vegetables.) Just because Billy and his 160 fellow Christians in the Bible belt believe that magical spirits come flying down out of the heavens, zip into the womb at the same moment sperm contacts an egg, and creates a miniaturized human doesn’t mean that the government is allowed to ban abortion. The government must act based on secular definitions. They have to consider the possibility that we program up a molecular simulator in a computer and, left running for too long, the simulated molecules merge and evolve and create intelligent life, operating purely as digital data on a CPU. Is it genocide to turn off the computer? If we can take a sample of elbow skin, turn one of the cells into a pluripotent cell, turn it into an egg cell, and impregnate it using a nanobot carrying artificially generated DNA strands, then is it just as much abortion to scratch my elbow as it is to take a plan B pill? A secular definition has to be able to incorporate the fact that basic matter - atoms and molecules - can become human life. Adult human _in potentia_ is not a viable standard for human life. It has to incorporate the possibility of digital life and alien life. This is the mandate of the 1st Amendment. What the actual answer is to that question be what it may, it cannot be based on a religious standard, and it’s reasonable to say that **most** votes to ban abortion - both in the general public and in Congress - are based on religious standards. That makes these laws unlawful. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/29 "2018-05-07T00:59:12Z")
> [@skyr](#): > > I actually suspect the REAL purpose of this type of bill is in fact to help raise public awareness of things like when fetal heartbeat can be detected (as noted here, some of the people on this thread didn’t even realize that the heartbeat can be detected at 6 weeks). The people who passed this bill know that it WILL be held up in court and not actually go into effect. Remember the pro-life slogan “Abortion stops a beating heart”? They’re trying to get you to think about that. > I find it really interesting that most people have a strong opinion on abortion WITHOUT knowing really basic facts like this. **“I have no idea what a fetus actually looks like at different stages of development or what the different methods of performing abortions involve, but, nonetheless, I am SURE that only a crazy lunatic would object to it!”** > > I think it’s also worth pointing out that very few European countries allow abortion on demand beyond the first trimester like America does. Abortion advocates always act like the sky is falling anytime someone tries to restrict abortion here, but to my knowledge, few people in Europe are freaking out over the fact that France, Germany, Italy and Spain don’t allow you to get abortions after 12 weeks, unlike in America where abortion is available until 24 weeks in many states (and in some states like New Mexico you can get abortions even later than that, even though babies that age would be able to survive if born). And then there are nations like El Salvador, where abortions are illegal under any circumstances and women are often jailed for years just for miscarrying and/or delivering a stillbirth. > **[El Salvador Frees Woman Imprisoned for Decade Under Abortion Ban (Published...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/15/world/americas/el-salvador-abortion-ban.html)** > > The woman, Teodora del Carmen Vásquez, was convicted of aggravated homicide after she had a stillbirth. She had been sentenced to 30 years in prison. Could this become the norm in the U.S.? :shudder: ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/30 "2018-05-07T05:07:00Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I’ve never understood the emphasis on heartbeats to begin with. It’s a vital life function that occurs very early in development. If you realize you cannot ban abortions, but you want to significantly reduce their number, it’s a great candidate for a milestone. You’re looking at things too much like a scientist and most people are not scientists. > [@](#): > > Dick Cheney doesn’t have a heartbeat, but nobody denies that he’s a person, with all of the rights that go along with that. But on the other hand, you can keep a patient’s heart beating long after brain death, when they’re no longer a person. Why would a heart transplant patient not have a heartbeat? > [@](#): > > Personhood is based on brain phenomena, and so if you’re going to be passing laws like this, they should be based on milestones of brain development. Or, if that’s impractical, find out what number of days corresponds to that milestone, and make the law that number of days. If your goal is to significantly cut back on abortions, basing the cutoff at brain function isn’t going to do the trick. You’d have to go for something like “development of the nervous system or the first stages of brain development”. But he thing about the heartbeat is you can show a video of a fetus with a beating heart. You can’t show a video of a fetus thinking. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/31 "2018-05-07T05:14:07Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > 1st Amendment. > > Just because Mahendra believes that cows are loved by Krishna and it is just as bad to kill one as to murder your neighbor, doesn’t mean that Mahendra and 160 million other Indians who have immigrated into the USA can vote for the government to create a law banning steak. > > Just because Kyoko believes that we are all reborn as different animals on our path towards nirvana, and so it is just as bad to kill a grasshopper as it is to kill your great-grandfather - since the grasshopper may well **be** your great-grandfather - doesn’t mean that Hollywood and all of the other Buddhists in the state of California can establish a law mandating that everyone else has to be a vegetarian. (Fish are okay - they’re vegetables.) > > Just because Billy and his 160 fellow Christians in the Bible belt believe that magical spirits come flying down out of the heavens, zip into the womb at the same moment sperm contacts an egg, and creates a miniaturized human doesn’t mean that the government is allowed to ban abortion. > > The government must act based on secular definitions. They have to consider the possibility that we program up a molecular simulator in a computer and, left running for too long, the simulated molecules merge and evolve and create intelligent life, operating purely as digital data on a CPU. Is it genocide to turn off the computer? If we can take a sample of elbow skin, turn one of the cells into a pluripotent cell, turn it into an egg cell, and impregnate it using a nanobot carrying artificially generated DNA strands, then is it just as much abortion to scratch my elbow as it is to take a plan B pill? > > A secular definition has to be able to incorporate the fact that basic matter - atoms and molecules - can become human life. Adult human _in potentia_ is not a viable standard for human life. It has to incorporate the possibility of digital life and alien life. > > This is the mandate of the 1st Amendment. What the actual answer is to that question be what it may, it cannot be based on a religious standard, and it’s reasonable to say that **most** votes to ban abortion - both in the general public and in Congress - are based on religious standards. That makes these laws unlawful. Have you read the court’s decision in _Roe_? Hint: It was not decided on 1st amendment grounds, but on 14th amendment grounds. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/32 "2018-05-07T05:21:17Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > 1st Amendment. > > Just because Mahendra believes that cows are loved by Krishna and it is just as bad to kill one as to murder your neighbor, doesn’t mean that Mahendra and 160 million other Indians who have immigrated into the USA can vote for the government to create a law banning steak. > > Just because Kyoko believes that we are all reborn as different animals on our path towards nirvana, and so it is just as bad to kill a grasshopper as it is to kill your great-grandfather - since the grasshopper may well **be** your great-grandfather - doesn’t mean that Hollywood and all of the other Buddhists in the state of California can establish a law mandating that everyone else has to be a vegetarian. (Fish are okay - they’re vegetables.) > > Just because Billy and his 160 fellow Christians in the Bible belt believe that magical spirits come flying down out of the heavens, zip into the womb at the same moment sperm contacts an egg, and creates a miniaturized human doesn’t mean that the government is allowed to ban abortion. > > The government must act based on secular definitions. They have to consider the possibility that we program up a molecular simulator in a computer and, left running for too long, the simulated molecules merge and evolve and create intelligent life, operating purely as digital data on a CPU. Is it genocide to turn off the computer? If we can take a sample of elbow skin, turn one of the cells into a pluripotent cell, turn it into an egg cell, and impregnate it using a nanobot carrying artificially generated DNA strands, then is it just as much abortion to scratch my elbow as it is to take a plan B pill? > > A secular definition has to be able to incorporate the fact that basic matter - atoms and molecules - can become human life. Adult human _in potentia_ is not a viable standard for human life. It has to incorporate the possibility of digital life and alien life. > > This is the mandate of the 1st Amendment. What the actual answer is to that question be what it may, it cannot be based on a religious standard, and it’s reasonable to say that **most** votes to ban abortion - both in the general public and in Congress - are based on religious standards. That makes these laws unlawful. This exact same argument could be used to say that a law against murder is unconstitutional. Because it’s an attempt by the government to enforce the Judeo-Christian commandment “Thou Shalt Not Kill.” The counter-argument is that it’s not a First Amendment violation for the government to prohibit something as long as there are secular reasons to do so, even if there is also religious support for the law. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/33 "2018-05-07T05:41:18Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Why would a heart transplant patient not have a heartbeat? I’m not Chronos but I would speculate that he may be suggesting that the heart that is located inside Cheney’s is not his original heart. In this view, Cheney’s heart was removed and is no longer beating. The heart that’s beating inside Cheney’s chest is somebody else’s. That seems ridiculous but I think it makes a good point in context. If we define life as the ongoing beating of a heart then the anonymous donor is still alive and Dick Cheney died during the operation. From a legal standpoint, it was Cheney who gave up his life and donated his body to keep somebody else alive. This absurdity makes the point that we should define life as something other than the beating of a heart. A better standard would be something like brain activity. ---
**Author:** ![raventhief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raventhief/32/4_2.png) [@raventhief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raventhief)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/34 "2018-05-07T05:47:04Z")
Also not Chronos but it’s unrelated, I believe, to transplants. Cheney had a mechanical device implanted that did not “beat.” > **[Is It True that Dick Cheney Has No Heartbeat?](https://www.livescience.com/33035-is-it-true-that-dick-cheney-has-no-heartbeat.html)** > > Dick Cheney is pulseless. Life's Little Mysteries tells you why. He may have had that resolved by now, I think. ---
**Author:** ![Chisquirrel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@Chisquirrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chisquirrel)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/35 "2018-05-07T06:16:51Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > If your goal is to significantly cut back on abortions, basing the cutoff at brain function isn’t going to do the trick. You’d have to go for something like “development of the nervous system or the first stages of brain development”. But he thing about the heartbeat is you can show a video of a fetus with a beating heart. You can’t show a video of a fetus thinking. If the goal is to significantly cut back on abortions, this law is utter shit. A woman finding out she’s pregnant seven or eight weeks in isn’t going to stop her if she feels she can’t carry the child to term, for whatever reason. She’ll just find another way to do it, which will most likely be more dangerous or life-threatening to herself. There’s a pretty simple formula that has been shown time and again to reducing abortion - easy and affordable access to birth control and education. This shitshow is an emotional plea based on religious dogma intended to drive abortion back into the alleys where women died. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/36 "2018-05-07T06:52:30Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > This exact same argument could be used to say that a law against murder is unconstitutional. Because it’s an attempt by the government to enforce the Judeo-Christian commandment “Thou Shalt Not Kill.” Presuming the law against murder is based on Christianity, then yes. I personally don’t believe that it is and I’m unaware of any religious/humanist angst over the topic. In general, the humanists are more anti-murder than the religious, trying to do things like blocking legal executions and such. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/37 "2018-05-07T06:57:09Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Have you read the court’s decision in _Roe_? Hint: It was not decided on 1st amendment grounds, but on 14th amendment grounds. I am aware. I imagine that they went that direction because the 1st Amendment argument would make people angry than because it wasn’t the more solid argument. The 14th Amendment argument (really the “penumbra of privacy” argument) says that abortion is legal because medical decisions are personal and private. But if we take the view that abortion is murder - which is the position of those who oppose abortion - then that argument makes no sense. Most murder is personal and private and the murderer would much prefer to keep it that way. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/38 "2018-05-07T12:37:22Z")
> [@raventhief](#): > > Also not Chronos but it’s unrelated, I believe, to transplants. Cheney had a mechanical device implanted that did not “beat.” > > [Is It True that Dick Cheney Has No Heartbeat? | Live Science](https://www.livescience.com/33035-is-it-true-that-dick-cheney-has-no-heartbeat.html) > > He may have had that resolved by now, I think. Previous thread No. 1: [Cheney has no pulse](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=571426&highlight=Cheney) Previous thread No. 2: [Dick Cheney finally has a heart](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=646197&highlight=Cheney) ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/39 "2018-05-07T13:48:09Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > I am aware. I imagine that they went that direction because the 1st Amendment argument would make people angry than because it wasn’t the more solid argument. > > The 14th Amendment argument (really the “penumbra of privacy” argument) says that abortion is legal because medical decisions are personal and private. But if we take the view that abortion is murder - which is the position of those who oppose abortion - then that argument makes no sense. Most murder is personal and private and the murderer would much prefer to keep it that way. People who oppose all abortions would redefine the legal definition of “personhood” to include a fetus. It’s been tried. There is nothing objectively correct about the current jurisprudence surrounding abortion in the US, so moving the bar is not unthinkable. Saying “it doesn’t make sense” isn’t a legal argument, and trying to tie abortion to the 1st amendment like you did would, I believe, be a lost cause. But the main point I was making is that you were not describing current jurisprudence regarding abortion in the US. You were describing some hypothetical jurisprudence that, I believe, wouldn’t fly. The current 1st amendment jurisprudence in the US is tied to the [Lemon Test](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_v._Kurtzman#Lemon_test), which is a bit more complicated that **Little Nemo** expressed, but he got the main idea right. When it comes to human life, there is always going to be an intermingling of secular and non-secular thinking, so you’re going to need to a lot more than just point at the non-secular thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2018, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603/40 "2018-05-07T13:51:35Z")
> [@DummyGladHands](#): > > And apparently AZ is looking at a law that says if you want an abortion, you have to declare why. > > Idiocy abounds It apparently abounds in Europe as well. For example, an article entitled [In Liberal Europe, Abortion Laws Come With Their Own Restrictions](https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/08/in-liberal-europe-abortion-laws-come-with-their-own-restrictions/278350/), The Atlantic says: > [@](#): > > In Finland … abortion is available up to 12 weeks of pregnancy, unless the woman is under 17 years old, in which case she may have an abortion until she’s 20 weeks pregnant. But even for early abortions, women must provide a “social reason” for seeking to terminate her pregnancy, such as poverty, extreme distress, or already having at least four children. While in practice most abortion requests are granted, it still forces women to prove to an authority the validity of their desire not to have a baby. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nearly-all-abortions-after-6-weeks-of-pregnancy-to-be-banned-in-iowa/813603.md?page=3)