Montana secured a win for the pro-life movement this week. The state’s Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte signed into law a bill that bans abortion after 20 weeks gestation, with the only exception being for abortions to protect the health of the mother.
It’s a good bill that represents the values of most people in the United States. While 60% of people think first trimester abortions should be legal, support for abortion in the country drops 28% for the second trimester and 13% for the third trimester, according to Gallup. Meanwhile, 20 weeks is about the midway point of the second trimester. There are pregnancies that last 21 weeks in which the baby is born and survives outside of the womb, making it even harder for the pro-choice side to justify ending those lives.
However, the Montana bill is also a sad reminder of how extreme abortion laws are in the country. America is one of just seven countries in the world that allow elective abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, according to the Washington Post. The list includes China, North Korea, and Vietnam. That’s some atrocious company.
So while many liberals may hail European countries, including Nordic ones, as model societies, abortion laws in such places would mortify them. Finland, Denmark, and Norway typically permit abortion only up to 12 weeks gestation, while Sweden’s laws are a little more liberal, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights. Sweden’s limit is typically 18 weeks, which would make it the strictest among U.S. states.
That’s not unique to these so-called social democracies either. In Germany, France, and Spain, the gestational limit is 14 weeks, while in Italy, it’s slightly shorter at 90 days. And Spain’s neighbor, Portugal, bans elective abortion after 10 weeks gestation.
Meanwhile, much of Latin America, from which the U.S. receives plenty of immigrants, skews conservative on the issue. In countries such as Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic, abortion is illegal without exception.
In an ideal society, there would be no abortion. Sadly, we are not there yet as a country as long as Roe v. Wade is still in effect and states continue to pass permissive abortion laws. And while the public’s view of abortion could use improvement, what’s clear is that the current abortion laws dictated by liberals don’t reflect the country’s values. If the laws reflected popular opinion, they would save thousands of lives each year.
Tom Joyce (@TomJoyceSports) is a political reporter for NewBostonPost in Massachusetts. He is also a freelance writer who has been published in USA Today, the Boston Globe, Newsday, ESPN, the Detroit Free Press, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Federalist, and a number of other outlets.
