Abortion As a Political Issue
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Authors
Kraenzlein, Emily
Issue Date
2024-04-04
Type
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Abstract
My research aims to explore abortion as a political issue considering the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling, which legalized abortion in the United States. I will be focusing on the 50 years after Roe, up until the recent 2022 Jackson v. Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and turned the right to regulate abortion to the states. Through conducting this research, I aim to uncover strategies the Republican party took to utilize abortion as a political strategy by tracing the evolution of abortion in the Republican party's views and agenda after the original Roe v. Wade ruling was passed. By examining the 50 years post-Roe, I also hope to explore the role of the Republican party in transforming such a controversial moral debate into a political debate. This will help me further understand the reasoning behind why abortion is defined so widely as a political issue, as opposed to primarily a health or religious issue. To conduct this research, I will be using primarily polling and survey data, but I will also be analyzing specific political platforms as well as investigating Supreme Court rulings. I will be analyzing polling data for Republican support of abortion, as well as the intensity of the support throughout the years, dividing my study up into different periods since 1973 to narrow down correlations within each period. I will also look at Republican actions before and after major abortion-related Supreme Court rulings. The hope is to examine whether there is a correlation between individual Republican support for abortion, Republican party platform views, and major Supreme Court decisions to give insight into the influence they might have on one another. While my research will likely not be able to trace back the origins of the debate to a specific moment in time, I am optimistic that my collection of data will provide a good roadmap that lays out Republican motivations, goals, and ultimate successes or failures regarding abortion.