On May 17, local time, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to rule on a legal dispute related to the Mississippi Abortion Rights Act. This means that a big "powder keg" in the US political arena, the dispute over women's abortion rights has re-emerged.
The controversy surrounding this issue can even be linked to the distant Palestinian-Israeli conflict, in which the core forces of anti-abortion and pro-Israel support in American society are the basic plates of the US Republican Party, the Christian conservative population. The Democratic Party regime in the United States has made it clear that it must rely on the executive and legislative power in its hands to protect the right to abortion, and the radical faction in the Democratic Party has even taken the initiative to expand the war and attack Israel with unprecedented intensity. This has embarrassed the Biden administration and highlighted the rift in American society.
On April 23, 2021, nine justices of the U.S. Supreme Court met for the first time and took a brand new official group photo. (China News Network Data Chart)
What is the origin of the "Roy case" that Mississippi wants to overturn?
Abortion rights have always been considered to be juxtaposed with the right to bear arms, and the oldest "war-inducing" topic in American society. It is generally believed that Americans' obsession with abortion stems from a christian tradition against abortion.
Because of the belief that "life is given by God", some Christian regimes in history have completely banned all contraception and abortion. In the United States, Christian conservative forces have also pushed for legislation, hoping to eventually return to a one-size-fits-all ban on abortion, or even a ban on contraception.
In 2015, protesters "lay corpses" outside the White House to protest abortion. (China News Network Data Chart)
In the 1970s, when almost all abortions were banned in Texas, a woman under the pseudonym "Roy" became pregnant after being raped and was limited to the legal restrictions of the time, so she sued the Texan government for violating her right to free choice. U.S. U.S. Justice Blackmon at the time upheld Roy's right to abortion in his judgment and established the famous "three-stage theory", that is, in the first three months of fetal conception, states may not legislate to prohibit abortion in order to maintain the right of pregnant women to choose; in the fourth to sixth months, states can protect the safety of pregnant women's lives as the principle of legislation to restrict abortion; after the seventh month, states can enact legislation to prohibit abortion and protect the fetus's "potential right to life".
In the United States, which has adopted case law, the judgment has been seen for many years as the legal basis for the right of American women to abortion.
The "Heartbeat Act" has been brewing for many years, and finally it is in the "ring" again.
The central and southern states of the United States, customarily known as the "Bible Belt," were at the forefront of anti-abortion policies. According to CNN, a total of 15 U.S. states introduced anti-abortion laws commonly known as the "Heartbeat Act" in 2019, and 4 of them were passed, namely Kentucky, Mississippi, Ohio and Georgia.
The Heartbeat Act means that women are banned from abortions from the first 8 weeks of pregnancy and leave no exemptions for cases of rape or even incest pregnancy. For many pregnant women, 8 weeks is not even enough time for them to find out they are pregnant.
Alabama then introduced a more stringent bill, regardless of the pregnancy cycle, almost "one-size-fits-all" ban on all abortions, abortions can only be performed when pregnant women are subjected to "serious health threats", and doctors who violate this provision may be sentenced to 99 years in prison. Speaking in parliament, Republican Congressman Clyde Chambliss, who supports the bill, made no secret of his religious motives: "I believe that if we have the right to end the life of a fetus, it is to put ourselves in God's place." ”
Under the influence of the Roy case, this type of "heartbeat bill" has been repeatedly ruled unconstitutional by the federal court system, and none of them has yet entered into force. However, the original intention of the local legislators is to continue to "find faults" through similar bills, and finally strive to make relevant disputes go to the Supreme Court to "fight in the ring" and make new precedents on the issue of abortion rights.
During the Trump administration, Trump joined forces with the Republican Party, which held a majority in the Senate at the time, and appointed 3 top justices with a conservative stance. This also makes the current Supreme Court considered to be the most conservative supreme court in the United States in recent years. It also inspired the determination of the Bible Belt state legislatures to "find fault."
On September 18, 2020, people gathered in front of the U.S. Supreme Court to remember the deceased Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg. After Ginsburg's death, the president of the United States at the time accepted the opposite of Ginsburg's political views, Ballet took over the position, bringing the ratio of conservative to liberal justices in the Supreme Court to a historically rare 6:3. (China News Network Data Chart)
What was pushed to the Supreme Court this time was a shrunken version of the "Heartbeat Act." A 2018 bill in Mississippi announced a ban on abortion after 15 weeks of gestation in most cases. After the local abortion clinic appealed, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit invoked the Roy case to dismiss the bill. The U.S. Supreme Court is facing an appeal from mississippi.
The U.S. Supreme Court pointed out in its briefing that the core issue in the current case is whether the fetus can survive outside the mother at 15 weeks. That is to say, the new Supreme Court is likely not to be prepared to overturn the Roy case in its entirety, but to incur a cannibal weakening of the freedom of abortion granted by the statute, for example, by raising the red line against abortion from 7 months to 15 weeks.
According to the American Overseas Chinese Daily, the White House has stated that regardless of the outcome of the Supreme Court's decision, the government supports the precedent of the "Roy case" judgment in federal law. The subtext is that the Democratic regime will support the power of freedom of abortion established in the Roy case through the executive and legislative powers it currently has.
Jews Against Israel: The Paradox of American Society Torn Apart
The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is another recent controversial topic that has torn American society apart. Recently, there has been a renewed conflict between Palestine and Israel. Israel has launched numerous air strikes against the Gaza Strip, and Palestinian militant groups have fired rockets into Israeli cities. The most famous female superhero figure in the United States, "Wonder Woman", is played by Israeli actress Gail Gadot because she has been besieged by netizens for calling for "both sides should enjoy freedom and security" on social media, believing that her remarks have obscured the essence of Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory and provoking conflict.
A location in Gaza City was attacked by Israeli airstrikes. (Photo from Xinhua News Agency)
It is worth noting that the criticism of Israel by US Democratic lawmakers this time can be described as particularly sharp. The youngest Congressman in history, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a "net celebrity" within the Democratic Party, criticized Israel as a "segregated country" and "without democracy." Rep. Ilhan Omar, who had previously accused his fellow members of the House of Parliament of accepting Israeli donations and being "manipulated" by Israel, accused the U.S. government of being "cruel, bloody, immoral and disgusting" for his support for Israel. ”
The European Times quoted the analysis of the German media as saying that the criticism of Israel by these emerging forces of the Democratic Party is no longer limited to some policy details, but questions the legitimacy of Israel's existence, and will direct the finger at Biden and Secretary of State Blinken, which makes the Biden administration face a lot of pressure.
A somewhat counterintuitive reality is that Israel's main supporters in the United States are not American Jews, but American evangelical Christians.
According to a survey by the U.S. research agency Pew, about 82 percent of white Evangelical Christians in the United States believe that God gave Israel to the Jews, but only 40 percent of Jews agree with this theological view. In response to this phenomenon, Al Jazeera explained that this is because evangelical Christians in the United States believe that "the Jews must return to their promised land in Palestine and establish a Jewish entity there to prepare for the second coming of Christ Jesus and the establishment of the Millennium Kingdom." Thus, "there is a consensus among most evangelical Christians to provide unlimited and unconditional support to Israel, while ignoring the legitimate rights of palestinians." ”
The total population of evangelical Christians in the U.S. is said to be more than 50 million, which is also considered one of the reasons why the Trump administration is one-sided in support of Israel. By contrast, there are far fewer American Jews who support Israel, and some Jews are most critical of Israel, arguing that the Israeli government's treatment of Palestinians does not conform to the civilized norms of modern society. Therefore, the "full fire" of these radical parties in the Democratic Party against Israel is also largely firing at the Christian conservative forces in the United States.