Americans Narrowing Support for Abortion
Times Poll: Results reveal a conflicted stance--they think it’s murder yet
lean toward leaving the choice to women. Still, support increases for
limiting the procedure’s availability.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/updates/lat_poll000618.htm
By ALISSA J. RUBIN, Times Staff Writer
WASHINGTON--More than a quarter-century after the Supreme Court
established a constitutional right to abortion, overall support for the
landmark Roe vs. Wade decision seems to be softening as Americans adopt a
more nuanced view of the circumstances under which abortions should be
allowed, according to a new Los Angeles Times Poll.
Despite the increasing level of discomfort with the high court’s
ruling--43% of current survey respondents express support for Roe, compared
with 56% in 1991--the poll shows continued opposition to a constitutional
ban on abortion.
Individual opinions about abortion are rife with ambivalence, the poll
suggests. Many respondents express positions that on their surface appear to
contradict each other but, upon exploration, reveal two strong but competing
sets of feelings.
‘Americans, in terms of their own code of morality, may view abortion
as murder and may be comfortable with it being illegal, but most Americans
don’t want to impose that on other people,‘ said Susan Carroll, a senior
research associate who studies abortion at the Center for American Women and
Politics at Rutgers University. ‘It’s kind of a live-and-let-live approach.
. . . Most Americans are in favor of letting people make their own
individual choices.‘
More than half of those surveyed say abortion should either be illegal
in all circumstances or legal only in cases of rape, incest or when a woman’
s life is in danger. At the same time, more than two-thirds say that,
regardless of their own feelings on the subject, the highly personal
decision to obtain an abortion should be left to a woman and her doctor.
Even more striking, while 57% of respondents say they consider abortion
to be murder, more than half of that group agree that a woman should have
the right to choose an abortion.
These conflicting perspectives make abortion a particularly tricky
issue for politicians. President Clinton attempted to straddle the
ambivalence in his first presidential campaign by saying he wanted abortions
to be ‘safe, legal and rare.‘ So far, neither Republican presidential
candidate George W. Bush nor Democratic rival Al Gore have found a similarly
deft formulation.
The issue could help--or hurt--both men. Nearly two-thirds of Americans
say they have no clear sense of either candidate’s position on the issue at
this point in the presidential race. But 34% of poll respondents say that if
they learn that a candidate’s position on abortion disagrees with their own,
it would be enough to change their vote.
The Times Poll, supervised by polling director Susan Pinkus, surveyed
2,071 Americans from June 8 through Tuesday. The margin of sampling error
was plus or minus 2 percentage points.
Sentiment Varies on When and Why
Bush’s opposition to abortion appeared more likely to help his
candidacy than Gore’s support of abortion rights will help his. When told
that Bush opposes abortion, 27% of respondents say that makes them more
likely to vote for him. But only 18% of respondents say Gore’s support for
legal abortion would make them more likely to vote for him.
Still, there may be risks in emphasizing a stand against abortion, some
experts say. If a candidate strongly opposes legal abortion, that could
mobilize opposition among sizable groups of voters, such as suburban women
and college students.
‘The country leans [toward] limited pro-choice,‘ said Bob Blendon, a
professor at the Harvard School of Public Health who tracks views on health
care issues.
Public sentiment varies considerably based on when and why a woman
chooses to obtain an abortion, the poll shows.
Nearly two-thirds of respondents say abortions should be illegal after
the first three months of pregnancy. While 85% support abortion when a woman
’s physical health is at risk, the level of support drops to 54% when only
her emotional health is at stake. And 66% say they support abortion when the
fetus is at risk of an abnormality.
The poll shows growing support for RU-486, the ‘abortion pill‘ that was
developed in France and can be used during the first eight weeks of
pregnancy. Americans are almost evenly divided between those who favor
making it widely available (43%) and those who oppose doing so (46%). When
the question was first asked 11 years ago, 32% approved of making the drug
available.
Overall public support for a woman’s right to choose has remained
relatively steady over time. But with abortion rights constitutionally
protected by Roe vs. Wade, Americans appear to feel increasingly comfortable
considering limitations on its availability. Indeed, in some cases, they now
appear to favor more restrictions.
One reason cited for the softening of support for Roe is that a
proportionately smaller number of Americans remembers the days when abortion
was an illegal, clandestine procedure.
‘It seems like a long time ago that it was illegal,‘ said Bob
Pelletier, a 49-year-old auto technician who participated in The Times Poll.
‘I remember way back a doctor doing it with coat hangers. That was scary.
But after years and years and over time, the worry dissipates and people
forget.‘
In recent years, Roe has been invoked by abortion opponents as a
barrier to imposing limits on abortion, said Harvard’s Blendon. As a result,
increasing numbers of Americans may view Roe as an obstacle to adopting
restrictions for which there is broad support.
(In fact, the Supreme Court has permitted numerous restrictions on the
procedure, such as requiring teenagers to involve their parents in the
decision and requiring women to wait 24 hours before obtaining an abortion.)
Typically when abortion rights are threatened, support for legal
abortion rises, according to polling experts.
In the last decade, for example, previous polls show support for Roe
peaking at 56% around 1991, when the decision was under attack across the
country. Most states had pushed measures through their legislatures that
either put strict limits on abortion or even banned it altogether.
In 1992, the Supreme Court issued a decision upholding Roe, with some
modifications. The same year, Clinton, an abortion rights supporter, was
elected president. Both events appeared to reassure people there would be no
dramatic changes in abortion policy. Subsequently, support for Roe began to
decline.
In a 1996 poll, 46% of respondents endorsed Roe vs. Wade. By 1999,
support had slipped slightly to 43%, the same level as in the current poll.
‘The anti-abortion movement has changed their tactics and made
significant inroads in changing people’s opinions about abortion,‘ said poll
director Pinkus.
‘Instead of asking for drastic measures, the pro-life movement knows
that the only way to diminish support for abortions is to push for
incremental legislation.‘
Supreme Court to Rule on ’Partial-Birth’ Ban
Abortion opponents have worked hard for passage of such restrictions as
requiring teenagers to involve a parent in the abortion decision and for
bans on so-called partial-birth abortions. The latter issue has focused
public attention on abortions performed after the first trimester of
pregnancy.
The Supreme Court is poised to rule on the constitutionality of
Nebraska’s ban on ‘partial-birth‘ abortions by the end of the month. Nearly
identical bans are in place in nearly 30 states. The ruling will be the
court’s first major decision on abortion in eight years and could
significantly reduce women’s access to abortion after the first trimester.
In The Times Poll, 65% of respondents said abortions in the second
trimester should not be legal. Female respondents feel more strongly about
the issue: 72% believe second-trimester abortions should be illegal,
compared with 58% of men.
The poll shows that while more than four out of five respondents
support abortion when a woman’s physical health is at risk, just slightly
more than half feel the same when it is a matter of a woman’s emotional
health. Support for abortions to protect a woman’s mental health is
strongest among single women, 64% of whom believe it should be allowed.
That distinction reflects a growing public debate over acceptable
reasons for abortion. Some politicians believe women should not be permitted
to obtain abortions, especially later in pregnancy, for emotional health
reasons.
Roe vs. Wade allows states to restrict access in the third trimester as
long as women are permitted to have an abortion when their life or health is
at stake. Health has been defined by the courts to cover both emotional and
physical health.
The findings appear to reflect a broader discomfort with issues
involving mental illness. ‘People are very ambivalent about emotional health
altogether,‘ said Nancy Adler, a professor of medical psychology at UC San
Francisco. ‘People would rather have a physical illness than be told it was
something in their mind.‘
For many people, thinking about abortion gives rise to conflicting
feelings. One of them is Vicky R., a medical sales agent in Florida who
asked that her full name not be used. She is among those respondents who
consider abortion a form of murder but also believe it is a personal
decision best left to a woman and her doctor.
‘I don’t think I personally would have an abortion. But . . . I don’t
know that it’s fair to make someone go through that--an unwanted pregnancy,
she said. Still, the issue troubles her. ‘Probably almost nobody feels
abortion is a good thing. I just feel it’s a personal choice with a lot of
gray areas.‘
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