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Overtun Roe? Look at Romania first
In 2007, the Cannes Film Festival jury awarded the top prize, known as the Palme d'Or, to a Romanian film whose translated title is “Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days.” Though I have yet to see the movie (this area being noted for its paucity of international releases), I await its arrival on DVD. The story involves two female college students during the brutal reign of former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, a Communist who was in power from 1965 until his overthrow in 1989. Faced with an unplanned pregnancy, one of the students desires an abortion. The complication is the ruthlessness in which the Ceausescu (Chow-sess-koo) regime, desperately in need of warm bodies to feed its industrialization aims, has attempted to eliminate the termination of any pregnancies. How ruthless? Let's examine a Romanian analysis performed over the years by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress and sponsored by the U.S. Army. The Ceausescu government banned virtually all abortions in 1966, with criminal penalties for those who sought and performed them. Men and women who remained childless past the age of 25 were subject to higher taxes, and divorce effectively was outlawed. At first, the new regulations had the desired effect, with the 527,000 births in 1967 nearly double the 1966 figure. Of course, police presence in hospitals ensured that no pregnancies were terminated, and birth control practically was non-existent. At the same time, both maternal and infant mortality rates climbed. The Ceausescu baby boom didn't last, and population growth again declined. Even offering enticements, including paid time off to care for children, failed to work. From 1967 to 1983, the birthrate in Romania actually declined 40 percent. By the 1980s, the regime really got serious, lowering the legal marriage age of women to 15 and again boosting taxes on the childless. The government ordered monthly gynecological exams for all women of childbearing age in order to identify those who were pregnant. In 1985, Ceausescu instituted “demographic command units” to see that all women had gynecological exams at work. Women and couples without children were asked detailed questions about their sex lives. Only women over 45 or with five or more children were permitted to have an abortion, and even then only under the supervision of a Communist party official. Of course, women who were not authorized by the Romanian “Big Brother” to end their pregnancies looked elsewhere. Illegal abortions reportedly could be had in exchange for a carton of cigarettes. In the final years of the Ceausescu era, large families were glorified, and contests took place to see which counties had the highest birthrate. I present this information as a cautionary tale in our country's ongoing debate about Roe v. Wade and the legality of abortion. Anyone who truly believes that a U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe magically will halt all abortions is living in a world of naiveté. Those with money and connections will continue to obtain the procedure, as will those who don't. And while I doubt this country would go to the extremes of the Ceausescu government, there undoubtedly will be states that would place extreme government restrictions on how a woman decides what to do with her body. In March 2006, South Dakota's legislature passed a law that would have prohibited abortions except in cases where a woman's life was in danger. The measure, designed to take effect if Roe was overturned, was stopped by 56 percent of the voters in a November 2006 referendum. My fear is that some states will go to the extremes if Roe is successfully challenged. Is a Susan Smith Prison for Female Fetus Killers too far-fetched for South Carolina? Or perhaps a franchise of George W. Bush Gynecological Hospitals in Texas? History teaches us that the tyranny of government knows few bounds and surely will be realized if the populace allows. How ironic that so many who defend the use of torture and the death of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians would be willing to turn over the womb to government control under the guise of “freedom.” Paul Teague is the Local News Editor and former Sports Editor of the News-Topic.
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