November 4th, 2016

Dear Future President,

What is your opinion on abortion? Will you help keep abortion legal? Abortion should remain legal to protect women’s rights, but as a country we need to reduce the need for abortion.

The debate of whether or not abortion should be a legal option continues to divide Americans long after the U.S. Supreme Court’s 7-2 decision on Roe v. Wade declared the procedure a "fundamental right" on Jan. 22, 1973. I believe friends and relatives can celebrate a pregnancy, but it's not their business to decide how a woman responds to her pregnancy. Women deserve to make their own choices regarding their bodies, just as everyone has a right to their own personal actions and opinions. Sharon Smith states, “Thirty-seven states do not provide abortion funding for poor women's abortions, and 32 of these won't even fund abortions for poor women who become pregnant as a result of rape or incest, or in cases of a severely deformed fetus” (Smith Sharon “Abortion: Every Woman’s Right”). Abortion should be allowed for every woman under any circumstances, rich, poor, if the women have been raped, if it's incestual, or if the fetus is deformed. Women’s rights should never be ignored in abortion because we don’t understand the emotional toll it puts on a woman.

On average, there are one million abortions a year. Two ways to reduce the amount of abortions each year exist. The first is to make abortion less available/remove the option. The second is to make abortion less necessary, which would be more effective and could reduce abortion and still keep people safe, which is what I want. When making it less available, people think that the issue of abortion will vanish. Even with abortion illegal, some women will most likely have an abortion illegally because they feel the need to relieve themselves of the emotional trauma. This is potentially unsafe leading to many female deaths. According to the The Guttmacher Institute, 70,000 deaths a year  result from illegal abortion (Guttmacher Institute).

Another idea is to make abortion unnecessary, which according to Arons Jessica and Saperstein Shira's The Right Way to Reduce Abortion, would be more effective. Half of the abortions in the U.S. are from unplanned pregnancies. Four ways to reduce the unintended pregnancies is to first promote sex-education. Sex-education should be required in all schools to teach students how to prevent and protect themselves from pregnancy and disease. Secondly, increase insurance coverage and public funding for family planning services for women will provide woman assistance throughout a sometimes stressful time. Third, give women access to emergency contraception to help women immediately prevent an unwanted pregnancy, especially from incest, rape, or other traumatic event. Lastly, providing programs to teach awareness and restraint from sexual abuse and domestic violence would also decrease the amount of unintended pregnancies. Though these ways can help reduce unwanted pregnancies, they won't eliminate them completely.

People should continue to support abortion rights throughout the country. I hope you value the information that I have provided you, and that I persuaded you to see eye to eye with my opinion. I wish you the best with the presidency.

Sincerely,

Hope Deddens

Sources:

Smith Sharon. “Abortion: Every Women’s Right.” Socialist Worker, 1992, socialworker.org. 10 October 2016.

Arons Jessica and Saperstein Shira. “The Right Way to Reduce Abortion.” Center For American Progress, 2006, americanprogress.org. 10 October 2016

Kruti Patel. "States disagree on abortion access laws." Campbell Law Observer, 27 January 2015. http://campbelllawobserver.com/states-disagree-on-abortion-access-laws/ 26 October 2016