05.05.2004

Fight for abortion rights

Communists fight to transform the working class from a slave class into the universal class that abolishes classes. Logically, and inescapably, this means that the working class - and its party - needs to take the lead on all social-political and democratic issues. By doing so the working class progressively elevates itself to the point where it becomes the hegemonic force in society and is ready and able to overthrow the bourgeoisie and begin the transition towards classlessness and general freedom.

Obviously, the abortion question is no exception - quite the opposite. It is not something that should be left to women or feminists alone. The working class must take the lead in defending and advancing abortion rights. Naturally, therefore, in the CPGB’s Draft programme the fight for free abortion on demand is united with our fight for secularism, open borders, republicanism, workers’ representatives on a workers’ wage, etc.

For Respect to backtrack on the struggle for women’s rights would be nothing short of a disaster. Abortion is a litmus test. Sheer numbers alone should demonstrate the political immensity of this issue. It is a commonly quoted statistic that one in four women will have an abortion during their lifetime. In fact, according to the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, that is an underestimate. At least a third of British women will have a pregnancy terminated by the age of 45. In 2001, there were 186,000 legal abortions carried out in England and Wales (17 per 1,000 women aged 15-44). That figure remains fairly constant from year to year, although there was a peak in 1996, coinciding with a health scare over the pill. What is Respect going to say to these women?

When we look seriously at today’s United Kingdom, it is plain that the battle for free abortion on demand has yet to be fully won - whatever various reactionary anti-abortionist groups might say. It would be criminal complacency to believe that even the cramped abortion rights we have now - achieved in the face of fierce resistance - cannot be rolled backed. Reactionary forces, most notably christian fundamentalists, are fanatically determined to enforce their ‘pro-life’ agenda upon society - by any means necessary, including at times terrorism.

History tells us that abortion has been practised almost since the beginning of human civilisation - contrary to much of the propaganda of christian ‘pro-lifers’, who would prefer us to believe that abortion is a modern sin invented by atheists, feminists, liberals, socialists … and of course the devil. Abortion may be as old as sin, but for communists and rationalists in general it is no sin.

In this context, it is worth a quick look at the pioneering work of French social anthropologist, George Devereux. During the 1950s his work demonstrated that abortion has been practised in almost all human communities from the earliest times. In fact, argued Devereux, the patterns of abortion use, in hundreds of societies around the world since before recorded history, have been strikingly similar. In his definitive A study of abortion in primitive societies (1976), Devereux showed that women faced with unwanted pregnancies have always turned to abortion, regardless of the religious or legal sanctions - and often at considerable risk to life and safety. As a device, or measure, to deal and cope with upheavals in personal, family, and community life, abortion is “a fundamental aspect of human behaviour”, to use the words of Devereux (p3).

In primitive tribal societies, abortions were induced by using poisonous herbs, sharp sticks, or by sheer pressure on the abdomen until vaginal bleeding occurred. Various techniques are described in the oldest known medical texts. The ancient Chinese and Egyptians had their methods and recipes too, and Greek and Roman civilisations considered abortion an integral part of maintaining a stable population. Ancient implements, such as the ones found at Pompeii and Herculaneum, were much like modern surgical instruments. The Greeks and Romans also had various poisons administered in various ways, including through tampons. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle were all known to suggest abortion. Even Hippocrates, who spoke against it because he feared injury to the woman, recommended violent exercises to induce a termination on occasion. As for the Romans they had no moral or social stigma against abortion.

The christian church’s attitude on abortion was never fixed and has certainly evolved over time - being subject to constant toing and froing and ‘amendment’, depending on the social and political vicissitudes of the day. Certainly, the founders and sages of the early church were less dogmatic than their modern-day epigones. This relatively tolerant approach, which prevailed in the Roman catholic church for centuries, ended in 1869, when Pope Pius IX officially eliminated the distinction between a developed foetus, said to be ‘ensouled’, and a non-animated one. He prescribed excommunication for the induction of an abortion at any stage of pregnancy.

What accounted for this relatively dramatic ‘line change’? It has been seen by some as a means of countering the increased effectiveness of birth control, especially in France, with its declining catholic population. In Italy, during the years 1848 to 1870, the papal states shrank from almost one-third of the country to what is now Vatican City. It has been argued that the pope’s restriction on abortion was motivated by a need to strengthen the church’s spiritual control over its followers in the face of this declining political power. Countering the rise of liberatory ideas, socialism and the working class was surely another factor.

When we look at Britain itself we see an analogous history - with the law becoming increasingly repressive. In 1803, a criminal abortion law was codified by Lord Ellenborough - this made the abortion of a foetus whose movements could be detected in the womb a capital offence, while abortions performed prior to ‘quickening’ incurred lesser penalties. An article in the 1832 London Legal Examiner justified the new laws on the grounds of protecting women from the dangerous abortion techniques which were practised at the time: “The reason assigned for the punishment of abortion is not that thereby an embryo human being is destroyed, but that it rarely or ever can be effected with drugs without sacrifice of the mother’s life.”

In the United States, similar legislative initiatives began in the 1820s and proceeded state by state, as the American frontier moved westward. In 1858, the New Jersey Supreme Court, pronouncing upon the state’s new abortion law, said: “The design of the statute was not to prevent the procuring of abortions, so much as to guard the health and life of the mother against consequences of such attempts.” Naturally, the great and the good only had the best of intentions - to ‘protect’ women from the consequences of their own (foolish) actions. Men know best, after all, especially if they are from the ruling class.

During the 19th century, legal barriers to abortion were erected throughout the western world. In 1869 the Canadian parliament enacted a criminal law which prohibited abortion and punished it with a penalty of life imprisonment. This law mirrored those of a number of provinces in pre-Confederation Canada; all of these statutes were more or less modelled on the English legislation of Lord Ellenborough.

It is vital to realise that this pressure for further restrictions on abortion rights was not coming from the masses. The American historian, James Mohr, makes the point that from an historical perspective, the 19th century’s wave of restrictive laws can be seen as a deviation from the norm - a period of interruption in the historically tolerant attitude towards abortion. In other words, the consolidation of capitalism and bourgeois ‘family values’ dictated the necessity for a crackdown on abortion rights.

What did this mean for women? Illegal and often highly dangerous abortions and, typically, after marriage one pregnancy after another and the burden of huge families. Queen Victoria bore nine surviving children; others many more. Monarchs, aristocrats and the wives of capitalists and top professional could, of course, afford wet nurses, nannies, private tutors and countless servants. Not the working class. An ordinary woman faced a life not of domestic bliss, but servitude. A slave of a slave. She had little or no time to develop herself or engage with wider social issues.

In Britain the 1803 law was not modified until the Bourne case of 1938. Dr Alec Bourne, a gynaecologist, aborted the foetus of a 14-year-old girl who had been raped by soldiers. He then turned himself over to the authorities in order to provoke a test case and was acquitted.

However, the main force for change undoubtedly came from women themselves - and their supporters in the labour movement. There were well-off women, such as Marie Stopes, who with the help of her husband’s money opened Britain’s first birth control clinic shortly after World War I. But her main concern was eugenics. Working class women were outbreeding their superiors and thereby undermining the fitness of the species. Despite her ghastly philosophy less privileged women increasingly used ‘modern methods’ to limit the size of their families, not least so that they could enjoy a fuller and less stressed life.

In 1961 there was another turning point. Despite the obscurantist objections of the catholic church the contraceptive pill became available on the NHS. This technological development greatly helped women - biologically, socially and sexually - and with that freedom came the demand for still more freedom.

During the 1960s an increasingly influential women’s movement came into being and its most powerful element was found in the working class. Women workers, most famously at Fords, successfully campaigned around the slogan ‘Equal pay for equal work’. To begin with, the trade unions were hostile or simply passive on the issue. Then they were evasive and divided. Only after much agitation and a lot of education did they begin to act. There were strikes, demonstrations and finally legislation. Women began to achieve formal equality in the workplace.

This coincided with the much fragmented women’s liberation movement, mainly based on women who had gained access to higher education, who demanded full social equality with men. Eg, an end to sexist language and the humiliation of married women not being able to sign contracts on their own behalf, and perhaps crucially the right of women to determine their own fertility. The demand was for the NHS to provide free contraception and abortion on demand.

In 1967, the Abortion Act was passed. Terminations were finally legalised - but only where two doctors decide, in all their mighty wisdom, that the continuation of a pregnancy poses a risk to the woman’s life, to her physical and mental health or to any existing children “greater than if the pregnancy were terminated”, and in cases where there was “substantial risk” of the foetus suffering from an anomaly. The woman’s individual wishes and desires do not come into the equation - the power to decide was placed in the hands of the medical profession.

In actual practice of course, many doctors now interpret the law liberally - but that does not detract from the invidious fact that they are nonetheless able to block access to abortion services on the basis of ‘moral’ opposition.

A survey conducted by Marie Stopes International (MSI) in 1999 found that 18% of GPs were opposed to abortion, overwhelmingly on religious grounds. Yet, outrageously, they do not have to declare this objection to patients, nor offer any explanation for their decision. According to Alice Richardson, chairwoman of the National Abortion Campaign, women report numerous incidents of “notes lost, decisions delayed and confidentiality broken” by doctors. Many women prefer to be referred to a specialist abortion provider, such as the British Pregnancy Advisory Service or MSI - both of which are charities. If seeking an NHS abortion, however, a woman initially has to go through her surgery or family planning clinic. So if your GP happens to be a fervent catholic or muslim …

She may then face a second hurdle. Since 1967 of course the NHS has provided abortion services free of charge, but in practice such free procedures are largely unavailable. NHS provision for abortions is patchy, resulting in what Richardson describes as “abortion by postcode”. The amount of funding made available for terminations varies widely from authority to authority: in 2001, for example, 96% of abortions in North Cumbria were NHS-funded; in Dorset, the figure was 61%; in Kingston and Richmond, in Surrey, meanwhile, only 50%. Health authorities set different time ceilings on abortions - in some areas, they are refused to women who are more than 11 weeks pregnant. Waiting lists - even for an initial appointment - are commonplace.

Parliamentary debates and legislation manifestly reveal the unfinished nature of the fight to fully legalise abortion. In April 1990, the House of Commons voted with one hand to cut the legal time limit for abortions from 28 to 24 weeks of pregnancy, but with the other it also removed the upper limit of 28 weeks in cases of foetal handicap or “grave permanent injury to the physical and mental health of the pregnant woman”. This was a rejection of attempts by anti-abortion campaigners to reduce the limit to 22 weeks. It was the first change in the abortion law since 1967. In 1991, RU 486 (the so-called French ‘abortion pill’) was approved for use in Britain for pregnancies of up to nine weeks.

We are still a long way from the vision outlined in 1931 by pro-abortion activist FW Stella Browne: “Abortion must be a key to a new world to women, not a bulwark for things as they are, economically or biologically. Abortion should not be either a perquisite of the legal wife only, nor merely as a last remedy against illegitimacy. It should be available for any woman, without insolent inquisitions, nor ruinous financial charges, nor tangles of red tape. For our bodies are our own?”

Apparently not. We should not forget in a hurry the words of Tory health spokesman Liam Fox. A devout catholic, he caused a storm in January 2001 by saying he wanted to see abortion banned. He backed off in an instant, admitted it was “unrealistic”, and instead declared a commitment to reducing the time limit governing at what stage of pregnancy a woman can have an abortion. This is a favourite tactic of anti-abortionists - to use the emotive ‘horrors’ of late terminations as a political Trojan Horse aimed against all abortion rights.

This is exactly, of course, what has occurred in the United States. Indeed, by any standards the US provides an unsettling vision of what might happen if progressives, socialists and communists are not vigilant. Born-again fundamentalist George W Bush has mounted a series of vicious assaults on abortion rights - happy in the knowledge that he has 40 million or so other christian fundamentalists in the US cheering him on.

One of the first acts of the Bush presidency was to stop funds to international family-planning groups that offer abortion and abortion counselling. This action reversed the Clinton administration’s stance. Previous to Clinton, US funds to international groups that support abortion had been blocked by former presidents Reagan and Bush (senior), in what became known as the ‘Mexico City policy’ (it was announced there by Reagan at a 1984 population conference).

Far more significantly, the Bush administration has already succeeded in passing the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. In the wake of this act, John Ashcroft ordered the justice department’s civil rights division to go after doctors performing partial birth late-term abortions, a move that is clearly meant to endow the foetus with civil and democratic rights. Slowly but surely, the ‘pro-lifers’ in the United States are getting their way.

You can be sure that this is just the beginning. Almost as you read this article, the Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress are laying the political and legislative groundwork for further assaults on abortion rights. Their strenuous efforts to ban all late-term abortions (and to legally redefine how late is late) is a direct warning - or threat - to the working class, both in the US and in this country.

There is a certain irony to all this, of course. Respect’s George Galloway is an implacable and indefatigable enemy of US imperialism - of that there can be no doubt. Yet, when it comes to his ‘pro-life’ anti-abortionist beliefs, he has found an extraordinarily unlikely ally - in the distinctly ungorgeous shape of president Bush.