Letter from the Editor: This Time Around, Politics Is Personal
On May 25 I refreshed my news feed frantically to find out the results of an historic election in my home country of Ireland. Then, there it was: The electorate had overwhelmingly voted to repeal the Eighth Amendment, decriminalizing abortion there. I screamed with joy and pride.
Flash-forward one month. Our team here was working on our September 2018 issue, themed "This Time It’s Personal," because we'd seen so many women step up to protest, to vote or volunteer in special elections, to run for office themselves, all for reasons that are intensely personal. The mood of the country had clearly shifted—this midterm season isn’t about politics as usual; it’s about how politics affects each of our lives in deeply intimate ways.
Then, on June 27, just as we were going to press, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy announced he was retiring. It became clear just how much is on the line in the 2018 midterms—and the 2020 presidential election on the horizon. And now that President Donald Trump has named conservative Brett Kavanaugh as Supreme Court nominee experts predict that Roe v. Wade could be overturned. Yes, there is a chance that the justices on the Roberts court could find some way to uphold women’s right to reproductive freedom based on precedent, but it’s just as likely that the 45-year-old ruling could be dismantled, allowing states to make abortion illegal.
History shows us that making abortion illegal doesn’t end it. Women in Ireland traveled hundreds of miles to Britain and the Netherlands to terminate pregnancies. Where will women in the U.S. go? Today in three states at least half of women of reproductive age already have to travel more than 90 miles to reach an abortion clinic; that distance will only grow if abortion is outlawed in certain areas. One in four women in this country will have an abortion in their lifetime. Will the U.S. really become a place where they or their doctors could be sent to jail? We’ve seen in many countries around the world that making abortion illegal only penalizes the most vulnerable women who don’t have the means to travel and, in worst-case scenarios, leads women to take dangerous risks to get the procedure.
There are many factors women will consider when they go to the polls in November. The Supreme Court can sometimes feel like an abstract institution, easily forgotten when you step into the ballot box. But the people we elect to the Senate decide who sits on the bench. I believe every woman should be able to choose when and if to have a child. We as a country can’t take a giant step backward.
It doesn’t get more personal than this, ladies. Time to vote.
