Recently, Right to Life of South Dakota and the Catholic Church were in the surprising position of joining with the American Civil Liberties Union and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists to defeat a bill in South Dakota’s state legislature restricting abortion. Why? Because the bill would have criminalized women who have abortions, not just physicians or others who perform or facilitate them.
South Dakota was the latest flashpoint of an ongoing debate that has shifted from the theoretical margins to the practical center of pro-life discourse: Whom do we punish for abortion? Dobbs permits states to pass legislation restricting abortion, but the federal government’s lax posture toward the abortion pill, mifepristone, has limited states’ ability to enforce its laws against anybody but mothers. Pro-lifers must seek new strategies at the state and federal level to defend unborn children, but they must do so in a way that evinces genuine compassion for women in need.
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