An Act
Concerning Women's Access to Abortion and Women's Right to Choose
Draft Proposal for US Legislation
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Section I. Legal Access
Whereas the majority of citizens in the United States insist that women need the ability to terminate an unwanted pregnancy with minimal risk to themselves at an early stage of gestation, and
Whereas a substantial minority of women who have been denied legal access to abortion have obtained abortion services illegally and suffered injury or death as a consequence thereof, and
Whereas many human fetuses can be enabled to survive outside the womb after twenty-three weeks gestation, and
Whereas procedures required to abort a human fetus after twenty weeks gestation can reasonably be expected to cause fetal suffering, and
Whereas it is often necessary to make legal what is less than moral in human society,
Neither Congress nor the States shall restrict a woman's access to abortion or abortifacients provided by qualified physicians or pharmacists during the first twenty weeks of gestation. The matter of abortion and abortifacients provided to women after twenty weeks gestation is remanded to the States, except that neither the Congress nor the States shall restrict access to abortion or abortifacients when undertaken to prevent the death or permanent and substantial injury to the health of a pregnant woman.
Section II. Economic Access
Whereas economic status can restrict a woman's access to abortion and abortifacients, and
Whereas individuals are required to pay taxes despite the objection that some may have to funding war, the objection that some may have to funding abortion may not be considered,
Medicare and other tax-payer funded National and State health care subsidy programs shall subsidize the provision of abortion and abortifacients to women during the first twenty weeks of gestation to the same extent that they subsidize any other surgical procedures and pharmaceuticals.
Section III. Physical and Informational Access
Women's physical access to abortion and abortifacients during the first twenty weeks of gestation, or to information concerning such procedures and pharmaceuticals shall not be infringed by individuals or organizations. Women's access to services that provide adoption and other alternatives to abortion, and access to information to about such services shall also not be infringed.
Section IV. Women's Right to Choose
Whereas a woman's right to choose to continue a pregnancy must be free and unimpeded, and
Whereas the potential outcome of sexual intercourse places a greater burden on women than on men, and
Whereas technology permits the establishment of a man's paternity beyond a reasonable doubt, and
Whereas a child chosen to be born has and will continue to have certain needs,
Congress and the States shall uphold a woman's right to choose to continue her pregnancy without regard to the will of any other person. Should a woman choose to continue her pregancy, the Federal Government and the States shall enforce the duty of the both parents to assist in providing for the care, upbringing, and education of the child from gestation to legal maturity as the latter is defined by the States.
The duty to assist in providing support of a child shall not be enforced against providers of donated sperm or eggs. The duty to assist in providing for the support of a child shall be enforced against parents by reason of adoption, consent to receive sperm or egg donation, or consent for a spouse or domestic partner to receive such donation.
