The United States government operates through a system called federalism – the division and sharing of power between the national and state governments. This system was set up at the 1787 Constitutional Convention, although the people who created the system didn’t have a name for it.
The representatives of the states at the convention created this system of government because they feared that the new national government would overwhelm the powers of the individual states. Eleven of the 13 states represented at the convention had been founded at least 100 years before the convention; Pennsylvania had existed for 96 years, and Georgia was the latecomer when it was founded in 1732. The states were all accustomed to operating independently from one another, and the weak central government under the Articles of Confederation had barely managed to hold the country together. This weakness is what impelled people in every state to meet in Philadelphia in 1787 to draft Phase Two of the governing system.
The fears about an overreaching central government were based primarily (although not solely) in the slave-holding states in the South. Because the population in the northern states was growing faster, the southern states realized that they would be outvoted on every issue at the national level. They feared, of course, that the central government would pass legislation outlawing slavery. The representatives of the southern states would not approve a plan of government that would lead to the abolition of their slave-based economic system. If it were not for the influence of these slave-holding states and their representatives at the Constitutional Convention, the United States would likely have become a unitary system – one in which the central government controls all broad policies for the nation as a whole.
Before you think “Well how could that work?” you need to recognize how uncommon federal systems are across the globe.
I’m writing about this today because the United States is once again embroiled in the question of the locus of power in our political system. Since the 2022 Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade, the power to decide abortion policy has been left to the states. Today, the Supremes are considering a case that would ban the shipping of mifepristone (a medical abortion drug) across the country. This is widely expected to put the country on the pathway to a nationwide abortion policy, contradicting the expected conservative position of leaving such decisions to the states. It’s almost as if hypocritical conservative judges are inconsistent in their desire to “leave things to the states.”
This entire discussion sets aside the question of whether there are actual state-wide cultures in the era of the Internet and the national (and global) transmission of information and opinions.
The fall of Roe tore Bristol in two. Virginia allows the procedure; Tennessee prohibits it. At the crux of the divide is Bristol Women’s Health, a clinic that opened on the Virginia side weeks before the Tennessee ban prompted a provider in that state to stop offering abortions. Before this, people seeking an abortion had to drive 150 miles to the nearest provider, in Roanoke, Virginia.
If you follow politics, you’ll recognize that Virginia is a purple state trending blue, while Tennessee is bright red. The shenanigans by Republicans in the Tennessee state legislature have gained national attention. Check out the social media feeds of the news site Tennessee Holler (which promises to “always yell the truth”) if you want to know more about this. This situation puts Bristol in the crosshairs of this national debate.
The argument against a national policy on abortion always boils down to the idea that individual states have a natural inclination toward one of the two poles of this question – pro-life and pro-choice (although it may be more accurate to identify the pro-life side as “pro-birth,” but that’s an issue for another day.) But the constitutional structure builds in protections against the tyranny of the majority – assumptions that the majority always prevails, even if it means that the majority decides to take away the rights of a minority. That’s the basis of most of the Bill of Rights – that your rights are individual and personal, and do not depend on how many people are on your side. The ADA is an example of this perspective; it requires public and commercial services to be accessible to everyone, even the small minority of individuals who have handicapping conditions. How many handicapped persons desiring access do there have to be for a building to have an elevator? The only correct answer is “none.”
The move toward government bans on abortion (at whatever level) rests on an assumption counter to the position taken by most jurisprudence over the past century or more – that an individual has rights that cannot be taken away by a majority vote in a legislature.
A couple of years ago I read a piece that ran something like this.
We shouldn’t have a nationwide abortion policy because some states would disagree
Logically, this means we shouldn’t have a statewide abortion policy because some communities would disagree.
This would then mean we shouldn’t have a community-wide policy because some families would disagree.
This would mean, in turn, we shouldn’t have a family-wide policy because some members of the family would disagree.
Therefore the only internally consistent position would leave the decision in the hands (metaphorically) of the only person who cannot opt out of the decision – the woman who’s pregnant.
Can it really be this simple? Ask Bristol. They’ve been trying to make this make sense for years.
Men have been frightened of women probably since the beginning of time. Why else would women not have the vote at the same time as men, be relegated to the house when men were in the House and Senate, or study to be lawyers or physicians or even attend college at all? If you believe abortion is wrong, don't have one. Women are perfectly able and strong enough to make a decision for themselves. There are times when it is pretty simple. Let individual rights allow us to do with our bodies what we believe is best for ourselves.
The idea that politicians should have a say in the decision about whether or not to have an abortion is insane. How can any politician know anything at the circumstances that bring a woman to this scenario? And how many politicians do you actually trust to make an informed decision? The only people who should be involved are the woman and her physician.