Abstract This paper examines why abortion should remain legal in the United States. Abortion was legalized January 22, 1973 via the Supreme Court.

Pro-choice advocates believe it should be a woman’s choice whether to terminate a pregnancy or not. Pro-life advocates believe abortion is murder. Teens that conceive a child out of wedlock are more likely to get an abortion. Teen pregnancies have dropped since the late eights and early nineties. Most adults that choose to have an abortion because of financial reasons. Before abortions were legal a lot of women lost their lives during the abortion process.There has been a crime committed toward abortion physicians and their patients. Should Abortion Be Legal? Abortion is a controversial subject in the United States today and has been for more than 40 years.

The definition of abortion is the induced termination of a pregnancy followed by the death of the embryo or fetus. Abortion should remain legal to prevent unwanted children from being born, neglected, abused, or abandoned. Abortion may be a practical solution for potential parents that are teenagers, low income, and inexperienced.When a woman is raped and cannot bear to raise a child that she conceived unwillingly may find an abortion the best choice for her and the illegitimate child. In some cases an abortion may be necessary to save a woman’s life because of medical reasons.

Abortions were legalized officially in the United States on January 22, 1973 when the Supreme Court ruling of Roe v. Wade. Jane Roe was a single pregnant woman who wanted an abortion by a “Competent licensed physician, under safe, clinical conditions” (Baird, R. M. and. Rosenbuam, S.

E. ). At the time the only way a woman in Texas could get an abortion was if her life was in danger.Woman would travel to other states where abortion was legal but in Jane Roe’s case she was not able to travel to another state do to financial reasons. “She claimed that the Texas statutes were unconstitutionally vague and that they abridged her right of personal privacy, protected by the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendment. ” She also said that “she would sue on half of herself and all other women”(Baird, R.

M. and. Rosenbuam, S. E. ). Do to the circumstances of Jane Roe the decision to have an abortion within the first trimester or within the first three months is left up to the mother in question and her physician.In the second or third trimesters the state may intervene and is usually only allowed if the mother’s life is in danger.

Justice Blackmum concluded that “the right of personal privacy included the abortion decision, but that this right is not unqualified and much be considered against important state interests in regulations” (Craig, B. H. and O’Brien D. M.

(1993). Since this judgment Pro-live and Pro-choice advocates have been in conflict about the legalization of abortions. Pro-life advocates believe abortion is murder no matter what trimester the pregnancy is in.Pro-choice advocates believe woman have a choice of what happens to her body.

Being a mother of a pregnant teenage child the learner knows the birth of a child from a teenager her prospects decline. She is less likely to complete school and more likely to be a single parent. The child of a teenager is more susceptible to behavior problems, poorer health, lower cognitive development, and more likely to be a teenage parent themselves (Lublin, N (2003). The cost to taxpayers for teenage parents can be catastrophic at an estimated annual cost of 6. 9 billion dollars ((Craig, B.

H. and O’Brien D. M. (1993). With abortion being legal taxpayers save money because of the decrease of public assistance, health care, and foster care that is provided to teenage mothers and other low income families and their children.

Teenage pregnancies have dropped since the late eighties and early nineties in all race and ethnic groups largely because of the availability of birth control and abstinence. “Experts point out that this decline is not due to the increase number of abortions” (confirmed by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention).It is clear that there is no easy solution to decrease teen sexuality but making birth control affordable and even free helps decline teen pregnancies. The public school systems educate our youth about safe sex and abstinences in an effort to lower the teenage pregnancies in the United States.

In the seventies by law minors had to notify their parents and receive consent in order to have an abortion but this law was easily bypassed by the minor going before a judge and declared to immature to make a rash and logical decision. Nether Pro-choice norPro-live advocates agreed with this process because it caused unnecessary delays in the process of whether the teen would be allowed to have an abortion or not. Most parents of pregnant teenagers agreed with this law because they were usually financially responsible for the teenager and the teenager’s child. Although all this changed in 1976 with Danforth and in 1979 with Belloti, the Supreme Court ruled that the constitutional right to privacy is not given to someone at a certain age, but instead is automatically obtained at birth. This gives minors “the right to obtain contraception and the right to terminate pregnancies” (Craig, B.H.

and O’Brien D. M. (1993). Adults that have an abortion are most likely to do so because the y do not have the money, time, or just do not want any more children. It is best to have an abortion than take the chance of a child to be abused, neglected, or abandoned. If abortions was illegal that children could be in grave danger or the woman of the unwanted pregnancy may go to uncertified practitioners or even self-induce an abortion which could result infection or even death of the woman.

The abortion procedure is safe and there are little if any harmful side effects.Pro-live followers have made clams that abortions have long term complications for women, such as, sterility, stillbirth, or breast cancer, but none of this has been proven to be true. For more than 40 years abortion has been a controversial subject in the United States. In order to prevent children from being abused, neglected, and or abandoned abortion should remain legal.

Teenagers, low income, and inexperienced parents may see abortion as a practical solution. Women that are raped may consider an abortion rather than give birth to an illegitimate child or giving birth to a child they did not conceive by consent.There may be medical reasons a woman may consider an abortion especially if it could save her life. Reference: Baird, Robert M. and Stuart E. Rosenbuam. The Ethics of Abortion. Buffalo Retrieved from: http://atheism.

about. com/od/bookreviews/fr/EthicsAbortion_2. htm Condit, Celeste M. Decoding Abortion Rhetoric: Communicating Social Change. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1990.

Retrieved from: www. universityofillinois. edu Craig, Barbara H. and David M. O’Brien. Abortion and American Politics.

Chatham: Chatham House Publishers, Inc, 1993. Court Decision That Made Abortion Legal.New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1988. Retrieved from: http://www. enotes. com/supreme-court-drama/roe-v-wade Faux, Marian. Roe v. Wade: The Untold Story of the Landmark Supreme Retrieved from: http://articles.

latimes. com/1989-06-18/books/bk-3553_1_linda- coffee-norma-mccorvey-untold-story Matthews-Green, Frederica. “We Can Find a Common Ground on Abortion. ” U. S. Catholic Jan. 1998.

Retrieved from: http://www. sojo. net/index. cfm? action=magazine. article&issue=soj9901&article=990121 Nancy Lublin, Facts About Teenage Pregnancy. 2003. Retrieved from: http://www.

dosomething. org/about