Providers are optimistic for a different future for abortion in the state even as Republicans flounder in their response
The waiting room of the Acacia Women’s Center in Phoenix, Arizona, was calm and quiet on Friday. Patients sat with their mothers, friends or partners, paying no mind to the slapstick Tyler Perry movie on the TV and an arrangement of Vogue magazines resting on a table.
It had been three days since the state’s highest court reinstated an 1864 law that would ban almost all abortions and send abortion providers to prison for up to five years.
The revival of the 160-year-old statute has kickstarted deep uncertainty over the fate of clinics like Acacia, one of the few medical centers left providing abortions in the state.
Some of the women awaiting the procedure that day said they were deeply worried by the state supreme court’s decision. Others didn’t want to talk about it.
I don’t understand why the age of the law is being highlighted so much. The prohibition against murder is probably one of the oldest laws in most societies, but its age doesn’t get dragged up all the time. And remember, a lot of the dipshits that want to ban abortion believe that it is literally the same as murdering a post-birth baby
EDIT: some people seem to be misunderstanding my point, which is probably my fault. If that same law was passed today, it would still be unjust. It’s the contents of the law that matter rather than its age, which is completely incidental.
I don’t think there have been many major breakthroughs in murdered people’s rights since murder laws were written.
Think about how women and people of color were treated in 1864. A morality law sourced from an immoral time in US history should not be relevant today. There’s no potential upside nor anyone seeking legalized murder.
What portion of the law’s tenure has it actually been in effect? Murder being illegal doesn’t tend to blindside voters.