Sex and Abortion

Sex and Abortion

            Robert A. Levine

The recent Supreme Court ban on abortion is not the first time religious conservatives have tried to take away women’s rights. And we are not the first society where there have been attempts to make women subservient to men and dependent on them. And this is not the first time that religious zealots have tried to tie sexual relationships to having children, trying to deny women the right to sexual pleasure without bearing children. What is wrong with men and women having sex purely for pleasure and not to conceive?

Religion and ancient societies have always been patriarchal in structure, emphasized in the Bible and all religious texts. Remember that Eve was fashioned from Adam’s rib. She was just part of a man while Adam was the superior being. In some primitive societies, women are still considered chattel at the disposal of the men who are their protectors and actual owners. There is even an aura of evil in some religions regarding women, who are labeled as temptresses who will lead men to sin and infidelity. Religious texts do not emphasize pleasure for women in sexual congress, believing that sex is for men to have pleasure and to create children.

Islam allows men to have four wives and original Mormonism also allowed men multiple wives, showing that men were superior beings. Conservative Protestant religions expect their women to stay home and have children, rather than pursue education and careers separate from their men. Religious Catholics believe that use of contraceptives is a sin and that the purpose of sexual intercourse is to produce children. Orthodox Jews are split on abortion but it is felt to be a conjugal duty that a man provide pleasure for his wife in conjugal sex.

In none of the western religions is there any text on the right of men and women who are not married to have sex purely for pleasure. Banning of abortion by the Supreme Court furthers the idea that sex that does not produce children is evil and that the mother must be forced to carry an unwanted child because she sinned by having sex. Of course, many married women become pregnant and believe they cannot afford or do not want to have a child and so have an abortion.

It is not a surprise that all of the Supreme Court Justices who voted to overturn Roe v Wade are religious Catholics, though Justice Gorsuch labels himself as Anglican/Catholic. The fact that these six justices allowed their religious beliefs to guide their decisions against the views of the majority of the nation is a detriment to our democracy. Though it is certainly not necessary to have justices proportional to the nation’s population, it is aberrant to heave 6 or 7 Catholics on the highest court in the land, with all of them appearing to follow religious dogma. How could they not overturn Roe v Wade when they have been taught all of their lives that abortion is a grave sin?

When John Kennedy was elected president in 1960, many Americans called him a papist, believing that he would be adherent to church doctrine. This did not occur but it is now the Supreme Court that is following the precepts of their church against the popular will. Their decision to allow religious schools to receive state funding in Maine that was given to private schools is further evidence of their religious beliefs and is contrary to the Founders desire for the separation of church and state. No religious institutions should be receiving government funds. And no teachers or coaches should be able to hold prayer sessions on public property after or during a school function where students might feel obligated to participate.

These justices who are Catholic acolytes might do better to try and clear their church of its rampant pedophilia which seems to be an ingrained problem at all levels, instead of interfering with secular laws that have been on the books for fifty years and have the support of the majority of the population. It is also unfair that presidents who did not win the popular elections and senators who represent a minority of the population have been able by hook and crook to fashion a minority Supreme Court who follow their religious precepts in ruling on their cases, bringing America back to a less open and less modern age. There are a number of ways that the Court could be changed to be made more modern and realize that sex for pleasure between loving individuals is not such a bad thing after all, even if it results in an unintended pregnancy. Women should be able to have children when they desire it, and abortion and contraception should not be made more difficult because of prudish men and one woman.

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Trump's Lasting Legacy

Trump’s Lasting Legacy

                        Robert A. Levine

Excluding Trump’s role in changing America’s relationship with NATO and other nations, his largest and lasting domestic impact is and will be his three appointees to the Supreme Court. These appointments transformed the Court from a moderate political body into a deeply conservative one which with lifetime tenure for justices will remain so for decades to come. There are two ways this conservative predilection could change, neither one of them very likely.

One would be by placing term limits on SCOTUS justices. Instead of life time appointments, this could be changed by a constitutional amendment to a set number of years, probably a lengthy term of ten, twelve or eighteen years. Given the increase in life expectancy since the Founding Fathers approved the Constitution, from 30 to 40 years in the 1700s, to around 80 in the 2000s, this would not be an unrealistic move. Depending on a justice’s age when appointed to the Court, the expected length of a term in the early 1800s might have been considered to be around 20 years or less. An appointment to the Court currently could be 40 years or more if an appointment were made when a person was in his or her forties. These gerontologic justices may well be out of touch with changes in society by the time they retire or die. Setting term limits would restore some credibility to the Court which has seen diminished approval ratings by the general public in recent years.

Another suggestion in a similar vein is to allow every president to appoint two justices in every four year presidential term, with the two longest standing justices retiring. With current standards, a president like Trump could appoint three justices in one term, while another president might get to appoint none, purely by chance. Having a set law on the books to provide equitable appointments by presidents to the Court would be fairer and allow more representation from different political groups. Trump was elected in 2016 by a minority of the American population and the senators who approved his nominees also represented a minority of Americans. These appointments are not indicative of a democratic system.

Some SCOTUS analysts believe that the way to transform the Court is to increase the number of justices on the Court as the population of the nation has grown dramatically since the Constitution was written. Only a small number of cases presented are handled by the Court each year and having more Justices might allow a greater number of cases to be examined and ruled upon. Opponents have called this “packing the Court” but it does seem to have some basis in the reality of the nation’s increased population.

Unfortunately, the way the Senate is structured, with two members from each state regardless of population, make new laws or dramatic changes in old ones unlikely. The Founding Fathers in their infinite wisdom had two senators represent each state in the union regardless of population. This means that California with 20 million citizens and Wyoming with 600,000 each have the same power to write laws in the Senate. Small rural states tend to be generally conservative and send conservative senators to Washington to represent them. This results in more conservative Justices being appointed to the Supreme Court.

We can point to Mitch McConnell refusing to appoint Merrick Garland to SCOTUS when he was nominated by President Obama during his last year in office. McConnell said that appointments to the Court should not be made during a president’s last year in office as the electorate should make this decision depending on for whom they vote. However, McConnell turned 180 degrees when Amy Coney Barrett was nominated by Trump in the last few months of his term, rapidly pushing her nomination through the Senate. McConnell did not seem to be bothered by his barefaced lie.

So far in the recent SCOTUS term, we have seen the Justices overturn Roe v Wade which had been law for half a century, disregarding prior precedents. Open carry of firearms was supported by the Court, notwithstanding the mass killings and the plague of individual deaths that have occurred because of the easy availability of guns. The Justices have also approved state payments to private religious schools, disregarding the separation of church and state. The three Justices appointed by Trump have formed the majority in all three cases.  This is his lasting legacy and does not seem likely to change in the foreseeable future unless changes are wrought in the Constitution, another unlikely possibility. Conservatives gaming the system have won.

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Roe v Wade and America's Secular Democracy

Roe v Wade and America’s Secular Democracy

                                    Robert A. Levine   May 10, 2022

Is America a secular democracy? Is there supposed to be separation of church and state according to the Constitution? If both of these precepts are valid, which I believe they are, Roe v Wade should not be in question. Abortion is a secular medical and psychological issue which should be determined by individual women and their physicians. State governments, the federal government, or the courts should not be playing any role in telling women what they can or cannot do with their bodies. Are any of these institutions able to tell men with enlarged prostates whether or not they should be allowed to have them removed? Or should men with testicular cancer receive government permission to have their testicles removed and kill all their sperm which have the potential to produce life. Of course not. It is up to the individual man to decide what to do with his own body.

So should it be with women. Unfortunately, certain churches are against abortion, even if it occurs before the time of viability for the fetus. Actually, adherents to the Catholic Church and Evangelical sects are the driving forces trying to limit abortion. With political pressure, these church groups have been able to gain control of many state legislatures and the courts in an attempt to ban abortion. They have been successful in many states and it appears that the Supreme Court is about to overturn Roe v Wade and ban abortion. Even though churches should have no political roles according to the Constitution, a minority of people who are ardently religious are interfering in the affairs of the secular state to ban a procedure that the majority of Americans believe should be legal. In fact, it is much more than a majority. Recent polls have had Americans in favor of keeping Roe v Wade as it is in the range of two thirds, varying from 60 to 70 percent.

If religion were removed from the equation, there would be no conflict on the abortion issue. If Americans truly want the Constitution to be followed, and church and state to remain separated, they should allow the majority to rule and keep Roe v Wade as the law of the land. Opponents of abortion say that there was no mention of abortion in the Constitution and thus it is not a guaranteed right for women. But the First Amendment to the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion for all Americans and says that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. One must assume that this is also true for all federal and state government bodies. Since prohibition of abortion is a religious issue that conflicts with the secular state, government should not pass any laws regarding abortion one way or another, as it should remain up to every woman to make a choice of what to do when she is pregnant on her own. Roe v Wade should have been considered unnecessary by the Supreme Court as the First Amendment already covered the right to an abortion.

Unfortunately, abortion has become an issue in America because some religions consider it immoral. Well, there is no reason that religious people who are against abortion have to submit to that procedure. But they should not be able to impose their will on the majority of the nation who believe that abortion is a woman’s right and up to each individual. The state should not impose religious values of a minority on all Americans, but should abide by separation of church and state.

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