FFRF condemns failed repeal of Wisconsin’s 1849 anti-abortion law lauryn@ffrf.org (Lauryn Seering) News Release Archives – Freedom From Religion Foundation – Freedom From Religion Foundation

Read More News Release Archives – Freedom From Religion Foundation – Freedom From Religion Foundation Fourteen seconds in the Senate. Twenty-five seconds in the Assembly. That’s how long each chamber convened during Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers’ special session to repeal a pre-Civil War abortion criminalization law. No action was taken and the dormant ban remains on the books. What contempt for women’s health and lives this cavalier inaction signals.
Wisconsin’s ban from 1849 doesn’t even permit exceptions or rape and incest. Their rights didn’t rate a discussion in the legislature. Debates and concern are already ensuing over what risks physicians might be taking if they help patients who qualify for the one exception to the ban — continuing the pregnancy would endanger their lives. That didn’t rate attention from the self-proclaimed “pro-life” majority in the Wisconsin Legislature — more than two-thirds of whom are male.
Should the high court overturn Roe v. Wade in the next few weeks, which the leaked draft opinion indicates will happen, Wisconsin’s archaic anti-abortion law is expected to go back into effect. It’s national news that Wisconsin clinics have already stopped scheduling appointments after June 25 in anticipation of the Supreme Court’s imminent ruling on abortion. This law, adopted long before women had the right to vote or advances in reproductive health care were made, is about to throw the state of Wisconsin into chaos, not to mention the lives of about 6,400 Wisconsin residents, which is the average number who need abortion care every year. Most of them — particularly the young, rural, low-income and women of color — will not know where to turn.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation has long called for a repeal of this 173-year-old abortion ban through press releases, letters to policymakers, action alerts, op-eds and even billboards placed near the state Capitol building in Madison calling for passage of a state abortion protection act.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation thanks Gov. Evers for his valiant efforts to remove the law and champion individual and religious freedom to choose.
“We’re faced with the same intractable quashing in the US Senate of the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would codify Roe v. Wade and even more protections federally,” says Annie Laurie Gaylor, FFRF co-president. “In our supposedly secular nation, religion is calling the shots, the threats to true religious liberty are growing and that’s why it’s imperative to resist, and get out the secular vote.”