People across the country praised and protested the 33rd anniversary of the 1973 Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade, which ruled laws against abortion violate constitutional rights, Sunday.
Pro-choice groups like the National Organization for Women organized events such as candlelight vigils and appeals to the Supreme Court, while pro-life organizations including the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops made statements of disdain.
“Even after more than 30 years of Roe v. Wade, abortion advocates still want to obscure and keep people ignorant of the true extent of the abortion license it created,” Deirdre McQuade, chief spokesperson on pro-life issues for the Catholic Bishops of the United States said in a statement.
The Supreme Court will soon hear cases involving limits to abortion laws, such as the case determining whether a woman should be legally obligated to notify her husband before having an abortion.
Another similar case might require young people to have parental consent from both parents in order to go through with the procedure.
Some students feel the government should have no say in how a woman treats her body.
“The government should absolutely not have anything to do with that,” said freshman computer science major Kayla Allen, a University of Mississipi student who is in the process of transferring to MSU. “Ours is a country built on choice: the choice to have our own religion, to do what we want in our lives.”
Allen feels that the government is overstepping its boundaries by trying to exert control over a woman’s body.
“This is most definitely a religious issue. It’s the overtones of Christianity in our government pushing through,” she said. “That’s unconstitutional.”
Others feel that the issue is too complicated to solve with a simple yes or no approach.
“If the woman is raped or if either she or the child will die, the woman should have the right to choose,” sophomore journalism major Nikki Buse said.
Buse does not feel, however, that an accidental pregnancy resulting from irresponsibility is a just cause for abortion.
“If a woman is old enough to have sex and have a child, she should be old enough to accept the consequences of her actions,” Buse said.