The Massachusetts legislature opened the door to late term abortions when it passed the ROE Act in 2020, though the law still contained some restrictions. On August 10, 2026, governor Maura Healey signed legislation that removed all abortion restrictions, joining 10 other jurisdictions in doing so. A local NPR affiliate posted the news displaying a disturbing photo of the governor surrounded by women gleefully signing into law the ability of the medical system to terminate the lives of preborn viable. Who thought the world would have less violence if women were in power?
The NPR story exemplifies that what is at issue is eugenics based, that a woman should be able to terminate any preborn child that is less than acceptable. In it we read the following:
Kate Dineen and her husband Alex Lawton recalled the journey they took to Washington, D.C. in 2021, when Dineen was 33 weeks pregnant and learned her baby had suffered a stroke in utero.
He would either die or survive for some period of time with a spectrum of devastating outcomes. And so upon learning of the prognosis, I asked, “What are my options?” And I will never forget the response. “You may still be able to explore termination if you’re able to travel,” Dineen said. Travel where? We were standing in our kitchen in Boston, just less than a mile from some of the best hospitals in the country. “The diagnosis didn’t qualify for an exception”, Dineen said, and their doctor’s “highly capable hands were tied by Massachusetts state law.”
Here is what the law stated prior to passing this amendment:
No abortion may be performed except by a physician, and only if in the best medical judgement of the physician it is: (i) necessary to preserve the life of the patient; (ii) necessary to preserve the patient’s physical or mental health; (iii) warranted because of a lethal fetal anomaly or diagnosis; or (iv) warranted because of a grave fetal diagnosis that indicates that the fetus is incompatible with sustained life outside of the uterus without extraordinary medical interventions.
This meant the problem was that Dineen’s son could have lived “without extraordinary medical interventions.” But he had a medical condition, so his life needed to be ended.
The law will now read:
An abortion may be performed by a physician based upon the professional judgment of the physician. No medical review process shall override the professional judgment of a treating physician and a patient or the patient’s health care proxy to provide an abortion consistent with [the above] section.
So long as a doctor is willing to terminate a life, then it can be done.
Massachusetts Late Term Abortion Laws
In 2020, days before the end of the session, the Massachusetts legislature overturned the governor’s veto to legalize what is known as the ROE Act, though it actually was a pared down version of the bill written by Planned Parenthood especially for Massachusetts. It legalized abortion up to 24 weeks of pregnancy, allowed advanced practice providers to prescribe abortion pills, and permitted physicians to perform late term abortions under certain circumstances.
In the current legislative session, An Act Prioritizing Patient Access to Care was introduced to remove all abortion restrictions. Just prior to the senate vote, the bill’s sponsor claimed physicians requested this removal to manage patients with preterm premature rupture of the membranes (PPROM). Following that logic, since PPROM alone does not put at risk the life of the mother or her child, an abortion would not be a so-called treatment option under the law. She would need to travel out-of-state to abort a child beyond the age of viability instead of receiving medical interventions to prevent infection and, if necessary, pre-term delivery.
The governor’s signature was only the final step to remove all restrictions on abortions. The 160 state representatives voted 121-35 in favor on July 22. All 25 Republicans voted against it, as did 10 Democrats, all called out by name in the local NPR story. The state senate took up the bill on the last day of the formal session, July 31. A standing vote was taken, so no senator votes were recorded. It was announced at the session as 15-4 in favor out of 40 potential senators in the room, so less than half the body voted. The Democratic governor did not wait long to sign it into law. Its passage fell distinctly along political party lines.
Precursors to Legalization
Many of us were surprised to learn that Massachusetts was not unique in removing all abortion restrictions. It joined Alaska, Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont, and the District of Columbia. (The Dineens had several closer choices than D.C.) Dobbs v Jackson – the 2022 Supreme Court decision that returned abortion legislation to the states, overturning Roe v. Wade (1973) – contains an appendix with all the state and territorial laws banning abortion in 1868, the year the 14th Amendment was passed. All 37 states and the 13 territories that would eventually become states banned abortion, though many with the exceptions of saving the mother’s life or health if determined by a panel of doctors.
The Eugenics Era of the late 19th and first half of the 20th Century saw the spread of birth control, medical infanticide, and forced sterilization, the last enshrined by the 1927 Supreme Court decision Buck v. Bell that has never been overturned. Abortion continued illegally in these years, and because this was prior to the discovery of antibiotics, many women died. Eugenic ideology ended once the world witnessed the atrocities to which it led in Nazi Germany, but not before it darkened the American conscience.
Those who devalue human life did not stop their work; they began again in the 1960’s under a new ideology: autonomy. Despite the plummet in abortion deaths after the widespread use of antibiotics, this did not stop abortion promoters from using deceptive information to promote the cause.
One of 11 Jurisdictions
Colorado became the first state to legalize abortion in 1967 for cases of rape, incest, or in which pregnancy would lead to permanent physical disability of the woman. In 1968, President Johnson’s Citizens’ Advisory Council on the Status of Women recommended a complete appeal of all abortion laws; the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws (NARAL) was established the following year. In 1970, Alaska and three other states legalized abortion, but Alaska did so without any gestational limits. In 1971, United States v. Vuitch Supreme Court case ruled that the District of Columbia restrictions relating to the “health” of the mother could be broadly interpreted as physical or psychological; it never had gestational limits. In 1972, the Vermont courts struck down any abortion restrictions.
In 1973, the passage of Roe v Wade legalized abortion throughout the country.
At that time, Colorado, Maryland, and New Mexico did not have limits, while Minnesota and Michigan stopped enforcing them. New Jersey repealed its prior laws in 1979, while Oregon did so and all its restrictions in 1983 in case Roe was ever overturned.
In 2022, the passage of Dobbs v Jackson returned abortion regulation to the states. This forced them to scrutinize their laws.
Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, and Vermont all changed their state constitutions to enshrine the right. Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, and Oregon either repealed pre-Roe abortion laws or created new laws declaring a right to abortion, all removing gestational limits. Massachusetts has now joined them in removing limits; will a constitutional right come next?
Sadly, another 18 states still have limits set as late as either fetal viability or 24 weeks.
The Political Fight Continues
The good news is that abortion is banned in 13 states. Most of them came about through “trigger laws,” meaning they were passed in anticipation of Roe being overturned, and took effect with the Dobbs decision. Another six states have limits between six and 12 weeks.
We press on in the political and social fight for universal human dignity, including the view that pregnancy involves caring for the lives of two people, neither of whom are expendable.
Leave a Reply