How to Ensure Equal Access to Abortion, and How We Failed Women

The Women’s March on Washington

I think pro-choice folks need to start by admitting that our efforts to ensure equal access to abortion through the courts has been a failure. We underestimated the lengths that Republicans (and their religious allies) would go to to restrict the right to an abortion.

Instead of trying to persuade people on the topic, we assumed that a strategy of litigation and Supreme Court precedent would deliver the desired outcome. We dismissed opponents’ deeply-held (if wrong) beliefs and hoped they would change over time. We assumed that many of the laws of gravity governing social progress would apply to this issue as well — the “long arc of justice” argument.

Of course, this has proven to be a huge miscalculation.

The progressive wing of American politics has been mostly content with fighting for justice in the courts, instead of doing the hard, grassroots work necessary to delivery victories “in the trenches”. Whether at the state, local or federal level, most of our progressive failures could be easily resolved by legislation. But because we’ve been super afraid of losing swing voters (a false economy if there ever was one), we have given our politicians countless passes and focused our investment on the courts.