2013 Is Shaping Up To Be The Worst Year For Reproductive Freedom In Recent History

According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the 2013 legislative session is on track to be yet another record-breaking year for state-level restrictions on women’s reproductive rights. As states’ current legislative sessions begin to come to a close, lawmakers have so far enacted more than 300 different abortion restrictions this year, as detailed in a map from the ACLU (click through for the interactive version):



According to the Guttmacher Institute, 2011 saw the highest number of anti-abortion restrictions enacted on the state level since 1985, when the women’s health organization first began tracking the data. 2012 was right behind with the second highest number of restrictive abortion laws. And now, even following an presidential election season that heavily emphasized the ongoing War on Women — post-election polling suggests that Mitt Romney’s right-wing positions on women’s health issues may have cost him the White House — local lawmakers in red states are continuing to pursue a stringently anti-abortion agenda.

On a call with reporters, representatives from the ACLU’s Reproductive Freedom project pointed out that abortion opponents have been more aggressive about their goals in 2013, and predicted this year will “go down in record books” for advancing some of the most stringent legislation this nation has seen since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion 40 years ago. The ACLU considers the mounting pile of state-level restrictions to be a “coordinated campaign” to eventually ban abortion in every clinic in every state. The group points out that there are three prongs of attack in this national strategy: making abortion services inaccessible for women, making it impossible for abortion doctors to continue their work, and forcing abortion clinics to close their doors.

Since the first part of that three-tiered strategy often involves outright bans on abortion, like the unprecedented 6-week ban in North Dakota and 12-week ban in Arkansas, it tends to incite the most outrage and receive the most media coverage. But the second and third tactics employed by the right wing are also incredibly successful at limiting women’s reproductive options — and, since those laws can more easily fly under the radar, they can actually be more dangerous.