Naturally, Hillary Clinton has spent a lot more time poll-testing her position than have these doctors in the trenches of health care. State abortion regulations have marched across the American landscape because they strike the sweet spot of the abortion debate, that place between criminalization and abortion-on-demand that commands broad majorities. These state laws are very often only superficially reasonable, especially if one believes, as the Supreme Court said in Roe, that abortion is a “fundamental right.” But their superficiality is their genius. Consciences are pricked by “partial birth” abortion. Parents become mystified that their teenager can have an abortion without their permission. Requiring a woman to cool her heels for 24 hours before an abortion seems like a common-sense precaution. New York has remained a fortress in the face of these laws. But in the next stage of the abortion wars, when laws tighten and women begin seeking refuge in blue metropolises, New York will be more fully confronted with its status as America’s abortion capital, and New Yorkers will be confronted with how culturally distant they have become from many other Americans. It is by no means certain how they will react.

See also:
The New Underground Railroad: The Abortion Train

Related:

• Archive: “Features”
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