Read an in-depth article on the background and potential impact of the proposition.
Behind the Scenes
- Introduction
- Changes from Previous Efforts
- Financial Backing
- A Constitutional Amendment
- Campaign Strategies
- Parental Involvement Laws
- Credits
Prop. 4 would amend the California Constitution to require that a parent be notified in writing at least 48 hours before a physician performs an abortion for a woman under the age of 18 except in a medical emergency. Women under 18 who are married, on active duty in the armed forces, or legally emancipated would be exempt. Unemancipated minors may go to a juvenile court to request a waiver of notification by explaining the reason and giving “clear and convincing evidence” to the judge that they are “both sufficiently mature and well-informed to decide [for themselves] whether to have an abortion.” Alternatively, parents may give a daughter in advance a notarized waiver of their right to notification.
Prop. 4 is a revised version of Prop. 85, which California voters rejected by an 8% margin in the 2006 general election. Prop. 85 was itself a revised version of Prop. 73, which was defeated by a 6% plurality in the special election of 2005.
Prop. 4 is a revised version of Prop. 85, which California voters rejected by an 8% margin in the 2006 general election. Prop. 85 was itself a revised version of Prop. 73, which was defeated by a 6% plurality in the special election of 2005.
The current ballot measure differs from the earlier ones in that it allows a minor woman to elect to have another “adult family member” instead of a parent or guardian notified. To do this, she must attest in writing that she “fears physical, sexual, or severe emotional abuse from a parent who would otherwise be notified” based on “a pattern of physical, sexual, or severe emotional abuse of her exhibited by a parent.” The statement alleging the abuse must be given to the selected “adult family member” by the physician, and the allegation of abuse must immediately be reported to appropriate law enforcement and child protective agencies.
Proponents of parental notification were convinced the most damaging argument against the 2006 initiative had been encapsulated in a Planned Parenthood-sponsored commercial aired toward the end of the campaign. “Think outside your bubble,” it urged voters. “Some girls do not enjoy the relationship with their parents that you may have. Prop. 85 would force girls to notify an abusive or violent parent that they are pregnant. And this puts them in real danger.” The ad did not acknowledge that the measure did offer a judicial bypass option. But, comments Grace Dulaney, a spokeswoman for the Yes on Prop. 4 campaign, “it is not unreasonable to be concerned about the effect of parental notification requirements on girls from abusive homes.”
Attorney Catherine Short of Ojai, legal director of the Napa-based Life Legal Defense Foundation and a co-author of Prop. 73, drafted the new measure to blunt the opposition’s “main argument.” It includes a clause permitting a minor to substitute a “grandparent, stepparent, foster parent, aunt, uncle, sibling, half-sibling, or first cousin” to receive the advance notification, as long as that person was over the age of 21. “If that’s the problem, now we’ve addressed it head on,” Short says. “Notifying another adult family member achieves our goal. Someone in the family knows what’s going on. It’s no longer a secret abortion.”
Several other changes were made to the proposed amendment. The civil penalty has been doubled -- to $2,000 under Prop. 4 -- for anyone who lies in order to help a girl under 18 obtain an abortion without notifying a parent. There is also a new liability timeframe, specifying that a parent wrongfully denied notification has up to four years after the daughter turns 18 or four years after learning about the provider’s negligence to file a civil lawsuit.
The advocates of parental notification personalized Prop. 4 by calling it the Child and Teen Safety and Stop Predators Act: Sarah’s Law. “Sarah” is the pseudonym given to a Texas teenager who died of complications following a legal abortion in 1994. “The abstract notion of parents’ rights didn’t move people,” Short explains in reference to earlier defeats. “We had to make it clear that real lives are at stake.” Adds Prop. 4 spokesman Albin Rhomberg, “Anecdotal information helps people understand what the issue is.”
In early August, opponents of Prop. 4 led by Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California sought a court order to exclude the title reference and description of “Sarah” provided by proponents in their ballot pamphlet arguments. Texas court records indicate the girl was married (and the mother of a child born the previous year), opponents noted. She would therefore, they pointed out, have been exempt from the law bearing her fictitious name even were it in effect. Sacramento Superior Court Judge Michael P. Kenny observed that he was “troubled” by proponents’ “artful characterization” of the case. Nevertheless, he ruled, “the courts have recognized that in ballot arguments proponents are allowed to engage in hyperbole.” Statements challenged by opponents were allowed to remain in the pamphlet distributed to California’s 16 million voters.
Proponents of parental notification were convinced the most damaging argument against the 2006 initiative had been encapsulated in a Planned Parenthood-sponsored commercial aired toward the end of the campaign. “Think outside your bubble,” it urged voters. “Some girls do not enjoy the relationship with their parents that you may have. Prop. 85 would force girls to notify an abusive or violent parent that they are pregnant. And this puts them in real danger.” The ad did not acknowledge that the measure did offer a judicial bypass option. But, comments Grace Dulaney, a spokeswoman for the Yes on Prop. 4 campaign, “it is not unreasonable to be concerned about the effect of parental notification requirements on girls from abusive homes.”
Attorney Catherine Short of Ojai, legal director of the Napa-based Life Legal Defense Foundation and a co-author of Prop. 73, drafted the new measure to blunt the opposition’s “main argument.” It includes a clause permitting a minor to substitute a “grandparent, stepparent, foster parent, aunt, uncle, sibling, half-sibling, or first cousin” to receive the advance notification, as long as that person was over the age of 21. “If that’s the problem, now we’ve addressed it head on,” Short says. “Notifying another adult family member achieves our goal. Someone in the family knows what’s going on. It’s no longer a secret abortion.”
Several other changes were made to the proposed amendment. The civil penalty has been doubled -- to $2,000 under Prop. 4 -- for anyone who lies in order to help a girl under 18 obtain an abortion without notifying a parent. There is also a new liability timeframe, specifying that a parent wrongfully denied notification has up to four years after the daughter turns 18 or four years after learning about the provider’s negligence to file a civil lawsuit.
The advocates of parental notification personalized Prop. 4 by calling it the Child and Teen Safety and Stop Predators Act: Sarah’s Law. “Sarah” is the pseudonym given to a Texas teenager who died of complications following a legal abortion in 1994. “The abstract notion of parents’ rights didn’t move people,” Short explains in reference to earlier defeats. “We had to make it clear that real lives are at stake.” Adds Prop. 4 spokesman Albin Rhomberg, “Anecdotal information helps people understand what the issue is.”
In early August, opponents of Prop. 4 led by Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California sought a court order to exclude the title reference and description of “Sarah” provided by proponents in their ballot pamphlet arguments. Texas court records indicate the girl was married (and the mother of a child born the previous year), opponents noted. She would therefore, they pointed out, have been exempt from the law bearing her fictitious name even were it in effect. Sacramento Superior Court Judge Michael P. Kenny observed that he was “troubled” by proponents’ “artful characterization” of the case. Nevertheless, he ruled, “the courts have recognized that in ballot arguments proponents are allowed to engage in hyperbole.” Statements challenged by opponents were allowed to remain in the pamphlet distributed to California’s 16 million voters.
James Holman, the founder and publisher of the San Diego Reader, the third-largest alternative weekly newspaper in the country, had been the most generous backer by far of the two previous parental notification ballot initiatives. He had put almost $1 million into the campaign for Prop. 73 and more than $2.5 million into the effort to pass Prop. 85. When backers of the failed measures began to talk of a third try, says Holman, “Quite frankly, I was not willing to go forward.”
But when private polling found a 73% favorable reaction to the revamped measure, with its family-member notification alternative, Holman decided to try a ballot initiative again. “The initiative process is a very effective and worthwhile way to effect change,” he says. “And this, family notification, is an issue most reasonable pro-lifers and pro-choicers can agree on. This is easily an issue for the common good.”
Holman notes that the measure has drawn criticism from some conservatives as well as from traditional foes on the left. The former, he says, object that “This just enshrines abortion in the state constitution.” But, he counters, “you have to pick your battles. [Prop. 4] is a reasonable position for a pro-lifer to take. It can save a lot of lives.” When the forces behind the two earlier initiatives reorganized last year as “Friends of Sarah” and set out to collect the 694,354 valid voter signatures they’d need to qualify the amendment for a third try, Holman contributed approximately $1.4 million. He also encouraged two Southern California family trusts built on real estate fortunes -- the Lenawee Trust, of Irvine, and the Caster Family Trust, of San Diego -- to donate $100,000 each. Don Sebastiani, Sonoma winery owner and former California assemblymember, has once again stepped forward -- this time with $530,000.
Proponents of Prop. 4 note that the opposition heavily outspent them in both their two previous campaigns. According to the California Secretary of State’s tally, expenditures by the pro-73 and pro-85 forces totaled $5.7 million for the two elections, while opponents, led by Planned Parenthood, put $12.4 million into counter-efforts. The pattern is expected to be repeated in this election cycle.
In the early stages, the supporters of Prop. 4 held the financial advantage, largely because they had to raise funds in 2007 to pay for polling and signature collection to put the measure on this November’s ballot. As of July 31, the Yes side reported contributions of almost $2.4 million. But, as in previous campaigns, Planned Parenthood’s nine local California chapters and other opponents quickly pooled some $4.4 million to defeat the measure, surpassing the $4 million they amassed to counter Prop. 85. Most of that paid for the TV “bubble” ads proponents believe determined the outcome. Backers did no television advertising of their own and they do not expect to go that route for Prop. 4 either, says Rhomberg. Instead they will rely mainly on grassroots media like bumper stickers, yard signs, fliers, church bulletin inserts, community events, and presentations before local groups.
But when private polling found a 73% favorable reaction to the revamped measure, with its family-member notification alternative, Holman decided to try a ballot initiative again. “The initiative process is a very effective and worthwhile way to effect change,” he says. “And this, family notification, is an issue most reasonable pro-lifers and pro-choicers can agree on. This is easily an issue for the common good.”
Holman notes that the measure has drawn criticism from some conservatives as well as from traditional foes on the left. The former, he says, object that “This just enshrines abortion in the state constitution.” But, he counters, “you have to pick your battles. [Prop. 4] is a reasonable position for a pro-lifer to take. It can save a lot of lives.” When the forces behind the two earlier initiatives reorganized last year as “Friends of Sarah” and set out to collect the 694,354 valid voter signatures they’d need to qualify the amendment for a third try, Holman contributed approximately $1.4 million. He also encouraged two Southern California family trusts built on real estate fortunes -- the Lenawee Trust, of Irvine, and the Caster Family Trust, of San Diego -- to donate $100,000 each. Don Sebastiani, Sonoma winery owner and former California assemblymember, has once again stepped forward -- this time with $530,000.
Proponents of Prop. 4 note that the opposition heavily outspent them in both their two previous campaigns. According to the California Secretary of State’s tally, expenditures by the pro-73 and pro-85 forces totaled $5.7 million for the two elections, while opponents, led by Planned Parenthood, put $12.4 million into counter-efforts. The pattern is expected to be repeated in this election cycle.
In the early stages, the supporters of Prop. 4 held the financial advantage, largely because they had to raise funds in 2007 to pay for polling and signature collection to put the measure on this November’s ballot. As of July 31, the Yes side reported contributions of almost $2.4 million. But, as in previous campaigns, Planned Parenthood’s nine local California chapters and other opponents quickly pooled some $4.4 million to defeat the measure, surpassing the $4 million they amassed to counter Prop. 85. Most of that paid for the TV “bubble” ads proponents believe determined the outcome. Backers did no television advertising of their own and they do not expect to go that route for Prop. 4 either, says Rhomberg. Instead they will rely mainly on grassroots media like bumper stickers, yard signs, fliers, church bulletin inserts, community events, and presentations before local groups.
Margaret Crosby, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, in San Francisco, and Kathy Kneer, president of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, in Sacramento, do not share Holman’s view that Prop. 4 represents a reasonable compromise on the question of parental notification.
“We all want teens to talk to their parents,” insists Kneer. “In an ideal world, great. In the real world, not.”
For those girls who fear parental rage if they reveal their wish to terminate a pregnancy, she says, the revamped amendment “just makes a bad situation worse. I think [the proponents’] goal is to punish teens [who get pregnant]. If not, they wouldn’t have put that high a hurdle in front of them.”
Parental notification laws have been enacted in 35 states since the United State Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion. In 1987 the California Legislature passed a law requiring a minor seeking an abortion to obtain a parent’s consent. Opponents went to court and after a decade of litigation the law was ruled unconstitutional.
Although the California statute included a judicial bypass alternative, the state Supreme Court struck down the provision in 1997, ruling that it was not compatible with the basic right to privacy guaranteed by the California Constitution. Concluding that the decision made it unlikely any law mandating parental involvement would pass constitutional muster before this state’s high court, notification backers have sought to have California voters amend the Constitution itself.
The ACLU’s Crosby argues that embedding such a law in a document as fundamental as the state Constitution -- particularly one that runs to eight pages and dictates the wording of specific forms to be provided by the Department of Health Services -- is a poor way to make policy.
“This really is an incredibly detailed regulation of a health care procedure,” she says. “I’ve never seen anything like it in a state constitution. And there would be no way to modify it except by another constitutional amendment.”
Crosby also objects to the Prop. 4 clause permitting an adult family member other than a parent to be notified, which she describes as “a fake option for teens living in a dangerous home.” In order to avoid informing a parent, Crosby asserts, the girl must claim to the obstetrician that she herself has been seriously mistreated in the past, and she must describe the “pattern” of abuse with full knowledge that the physician is required by law to include a copy of her statement in her medical record and give it to the substitute family member and the police. “This is putting a teen in an impossible position,” Crosby argues.
Kneer of Planned Parenthood believes that Prop. 4’s definitions are too narrow. “Even if a teen saw her older sister getting beaten after telling her parents she was pregnant, it wouldn’t meet the criterion. The abuse has to be related to her.”
Opponents also worry that Prop. 4 creates an unprecedented liability for the physician who performs an abortion, since a woman has until the age of 22 to sue an abortion provider for claimed negligence if a parent wasn’t informed. Furthermore, a parent who believes he or she was wrongfully denied notification can bring suit any time within four years after he or she “discovers or reasonably should have discovered” the failure. “This is just meant to intimidate providers,” Kneer suggests.
Prop. 4, like Prop. 85, does offer a girl under 18 who wants an abortion without telling her parents a third alternative to a claim of abuse or a “clear and convincing” petition to a juvenile court judge (subject to appeal if denied). She can ask her mother or father or guardian for -- or be voluntarily gifted with -- a signed and dated advance waiver of the notification requirement. It must bear a notary’s seal unless the form is hand-delivered to the abortion provider by the parent. It may be valid for 30 days, or until a specified date, or until the girl’s 18th birthday. Kneer dismisses this option as unrealistic. “They’re trying to sound so enlightened,” she says.
“We all want teens to talk to their parents,” insists Kneer. “In an ideal world, great. In the real world, not.”
For those girls who fear parental rage if they reveal their wish to terminate a pregnancy, she says, the revamped amendment “just makes a bad situation worse. I think [the proponents’] goal is to punish teens [who get pregnant]. If not, they wouldn’t have put that high a hurdle in front of them.”
Parental notification laws have been enacted in 35 states since the United State Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion. In 1987 the California Legislature passed a law requiring a minor seeking an abortion to obtain a parent’s consent. Opponents went to court and after a decade of litigation the law was ruled unconstitutional.
Although the California statute included a judicial bypass alternative, the state Supreme Court struck down the provision in 1997, ruling that it was not compatible with the basic right to privacy guaranteed by the California Constitution. Concluding that the decision made it unlikely any law mandating parental involvement would pass constitutional muster before this state’s high court, notification backers have sought to have California voters amend the Constitution itself.
The ACLU’s Crosby argues that embedding such a law in a document as fundamental as the state Constitution -- particularly one that runs to eight pages and dictates the wording of specific forms to be provided by the Department of Health Services -- is a poor way to make policy.
“This really is an incredibly detailed regulation of a health care procedure,” she says. “I’ve never seen anything like it in a state constitution. And there would be no way to modify it except by another constitutional amendment.”
Crosby also objects to the Prop. 4 clause permitting an adult family member other than a parent to be notified, which she describes as “a fake option for teens living in a dangerous home.” In order to avoid informing a parent, Crosby asserts, the girl must claim to the obstetrician that she herself has been seriously mistreated in the past, and she must describe the “pattern” of abuse with full knowledge that the physician is required by law to include a copy of her statement in her medical record and give it to the substitute family member and the police. “This is putting a teen in an impossible position,” Crosby argues.
Kneer of Planned Parenthood believes that Prop. 4’s definitions are too narrow. “Even if a teen saw her older sister getting beaten after telling her parents she was pregnant, it wouldn’t meet the criterion. The abuse has to be related to her.”
Opponents also worry that Prop. 4 creates an unprecedented liability for the physician who performs an abortion, since a woman has until the age of 22 to sue an abortion provider for claimed negligence if a parent wasn’t informed. Furthermore, a parent who believes he or she was wrongfully denied notification can bring suit any time within four years after he or she “discovers or reasonably should have discovered” the failure. “This is just meant to intimidate providers,” Kneer suggests.
Prop. 4, like Prop. 85, does offer a girl under 18 who wants an abortion without telling her parents a third alternative to a claim of abuse or a “clear and convincing” petition to a juvenile court judge (subject to appeal if denied). She can ask her mother or father or guardian for -- or be voluntarily gifted with -- a signed and dated advance waiver of the notification requirement. It must bear a notary’s seal unless the form is hand-delivered to the abortion provider by the parent. It may be valid for 30 days, or until a specified date, or until the girl’s 18th birthday. Kneer dismisses this option as unrealistic. “They’re trying to sound so enlightened,” she says.
Advocates of parental notification acknowledge it is unusual to bring a measure before the voters three times in quick succession. “If you’re against it, you call this ‘abuse of process,’” concedes Rhomberg. “If you’re in favor, you call it ‘commitment.’”
Short contends that “the proponents of ‘Sarah’s Law’…are committed to protecting young girls from the dangers of secret abortions. These dangers include not only the medical risks of surgery kept hidden from parents…but also the physical and emotional risks to girls victimized by sexual predators who use secret abortions to cover up their crimes.”
Proponents plan to spread their message through emails, blogs, and popular multimedia Web sites like YouTube. Their own Web sites are offering $3,000 in prizes to amateur producers of YouTube video ads that promote Prop. 4 through, for example, “the story of a young girl you know... a spoof of arguments from the other side... animation... [or] Sarah’s story.” (Proposition 4 Web sites: YesOn4.net)
Advocates claim Planned Parenthood opposes parental notification because the nonprofit organization provides abortions in many of its 100-odd clinics statewide and thus has a financial stake in maintaining the status quo. Kneer responds that abortion accounts for only 3% of the organization’s services -- which are primarily focused on preventive care, sex education, and contraception. Moreover, she says, more than 90% of Planned Parenthood patients qualify for Medi-Cal, which will pay for abortions, but its reimbursement rates are notoriously low and have long been frozen. Federal funds do not cover abortion. “No one can make money on Medi-Cal abortions,” insists Kneer.
Prop. 4 advocates stress the ironic disparity when a minor is required to get parental permission to enter a tanning salon but can have an abortion without anyone in the family knowing. They contend that many girls under 18 are, in the words of Dulaney, “impregnated by adult sexual predators who, under California law, are hiding their crimes of statutory rape by coercing their victims to have secret abortions.”
Holman, the father of four daughters between the ages of 12 and 21, says Prop. 4 is “progressive legislation for a progressive state.”
Kneer disagrees. The ruling by the California Supreme Court that invalidated the 1987 parental consent requirement was based on “overwhelming evidence in the trial that these laws are harmful,” she says. “They cause teens to do desperate things.”
Short contends that “the proponents of ‘Sarah’s Law’…are committed to protecting young girls from the dangers of secret abortions. These dangers include not only the medical risks of surgery kept hidden from parents…but also the physical and emotional risks to girls victimized by sexual predators who use secret abortions to cover up their crimes.”
Proponents plan to spread their message through emails, blogs, and popular multimedia Web sites like YouTube. Their own Web sites are offering $3,000 in prizes to amateur producers of YouTube video ads that promote Prop. 4 through, for example, “the story of a young girl you know... a spoof of arguments from the other side... animation... [or] Sarah’s story.” (Proposition 4 Web sites: YesOn4.net)
Advocates claim Planned Parenthood opposes parental notification because the nonprofit organization provides abortions in many of its 100-odd clinics statewide and thus has a financial stake in maintaining the status quo. Kneer responds that abortion accounts for only 3% of the organization’s services -- which are primarily focused on preventive care, sex education, and contraception. Moreover, she says, more than 90% of Planned Parenthood patients qualify for Medi-Cal, which will pay for abortions, but its reimbursement rates are notoriously low and have long been frozen. Federal funds do not cover abortion. “No one can make money on Medi-Cal abortions,” insists Kneer.
Prop. 4 advocates stress the ironic disparity when a minor is required to get parental permission to enter a tanning salon but can have an abortion without anyone in the family knowing. They contend that many girls under 18 are, in the words of Dulaney, “impregnated by adult sexual predators who, under California law, are hiding their crimes of statutory rape by coercing their victims to have secret abortions.”
Holman, the father of four daughters between the ages of 12 and 21, says Prop. 4 is “progressive legislation for a progressive state.”
Kneer disagrees. The ruling by the California Supreme Court that invalidated the 1987 parental consent requirement was based on “overwhelming evidence in the trial that these laws are harmful,” she says. “They cause teens to do desperate things.”
According to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, women between the ages of 15 and 19 accounted for 16.6% of all reported abortions in the United States in 2004. (National statistics, however, do not include data from California, Florida, New Hampshire, West Virginia, the District of Columbia, or New York City, none of which publish abortion rates. Girls under 15 have the highest ratio of abortions to live births, but they represented 0.6% of the 839,226 women reported to have undergone the procedure that year. (Proposition 4 Web sites: YesOn4.net)
Of 35 states with operative “parental involvement” laws, 22 require a minor to obtain parental consent for an abortion, and two -- Mississippi and North Dakota -- require the consent of both parents. A 24-hour waiting period between counseling and the abortion is required in 21 states; the waiting period is 18 hours in Indiana, one hour in South Carolina, and the “prior day” in Arkansas.
Proponents of Prop. 4 assert that parental notification and consent laws have been responsible for substantial reductions in pregnancies and abortions among minors. Data to support this assertion are mixed. Nationwide, according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, the birth rate among married and unmarried teenage girls between the ages of 15 and 17 increased from 21 births per 1,000 in 2005 to 22 births per 1,000 in 2006 after falling steadily since 1991 (America's Children in Brief: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2008). The birth rate among California teenagers also rose for the first time in 15 years in 2006, though by less than 1%: from 37.2 to 37.8 (“California Teen Birth Rate Increases First Time In 15 Years, Report Says,” Medical News Today, May 23, 2008) births for every 1,000 females between the ages of 15 and 19, according to the California Department of Health Services. (Birth rate is often used as a proxy for pregnancy rate, but it is affected by increases or decreases in spontaneous and induced abortions and is thus not representative of the true pregnancy rate.)
In 2000, according to estimates by the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization focused on sexual and reproductive health, California had the seventh-highest teenage pregnancy rate of any state -- an estimated 113,000 annually -- of which 37% ended in abortion (Guttmacher Institute overview page on abortion).
Although California is one of three states that do not collect and report official abortion statistics, the Guttmacher Institute conducts its own periodic surveys of all known abortion providers in the 50 states. Its 2005 data indicate that of 887,900 California women between the ages of 15 and 44 who became pregnant that year, 23% -- 208,430 -- obtained an abortion. That represents a rate of 27.1 abortions per 1,000 women of reproductive age, a decline of 13% since 2000, when the rate was 31.2 abortions per 1,000 women. California’s Medi-Cal program indicates it funded 94,602 abortions in 2005. Girls under age 15 accounted for 453 of these procedures and girls between the ages of 15 and 17 accounted for 6,204.
Opponents of Prop. 4 emphasize that without any new state laws the abortion rate has dropped faster in California than in the nation overall. Guttmacher Institute data show the national abortion rate to have declined 9% since 2000.
Opponents of the initiative fear that a parental notification law could influence some teenagers to delay medical care or turn to self-induced or unsafe abortions. According to the nonpartisan state Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO), however, “studies of similar laws in other states suggest that the effect of this measure on the birth rate for California minors would be limited, if any.” Were it to result in a decrease in abortions in the state, the LAO observed, that might be offset by out-of-state abortions. The nearby states of Oregon and Nevada have no legal restrictions.
Of 35 states with operative “parental involvement” laws, 22 require a minor to obtain parental consent for an abortion, and two -- Mississippi and North Dakota -- require the consent of both parents. A 24-hour waiting period between counseling and the abortion is required in 21 states; the waiting period is 18 hours in Indiana, one hour in South Carolina, and the “prior day” in Arkansas.
Proponents of Prop. 4 assert that parental notification and consent laws have been responsible for substantial reductions in pregnancies and abortions among minors. Data to support this assertion are mixed. Nationwide, according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, the birth rate among married and unmarried teenage girls between the ages of 15 and 17 increased from 21 births per 1,000 in 2005 to 22 births per 1,000 in 2006 after falling steadily since 1991 (America's Children in Brief: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2008). The birth rate among California teenagers also rose for the first time in 15 years in 2006, though by less than 1%: from 37.2 to 37.8 (“California Teen Birth Rate Increases First Time In 15 Years, Report Says,” Medical News Today, May 23, 2008) births for every 1,000 females between the ages of 15 and 19, according to the California Department of Health Services. (Birth rate is often used as a proxy for pregnancy rate, but it is affected by increases or decreases in spontaneous and induced abortions and is thus not representative of the true pregnancy rate.)
In 2000, according to estimates by the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization focused on sexual and reproductive health, California had the seventh-highest teenage pregnancy rate of any state -- an estimated 113,000 annually -- of which 37% ended in abortion (Guttmacher Institute overview page on abortion).
Although California is one of three states that do not collect and report official abortion statistics, the Guttmacher Institute conducts its own periodic surveys of all known abortion providers in the 50 states. Its 2005 data indicate that of 887,900 California women between the ages of 15 and 44 who became pregnant that year, 23% -- 208,430 -- obtained an abortion. That represents a rate of 27.1 abortions per 1,000 women of reproductive age, a decline of 13% since 2000, when the rate was 31.2 abortions per 1,000 women. California’s Medi-Cal program indicates it funded 94,602 abortions in 2005. Girls under age 15 accounted for 453 of these procedures and girls between the ages of 15 and 17 accounted for 6,204.
Opponents of Prop. 4 emphasize that without any new state laws the abortion rate has dropped faster in California than in the nation overall. Guttmacher Institute data show the national abortion rate to have declined 9% since 2000.
Opponents of the initiative fear that a parental notification law could influence some teenagers to delay medical care or turn to self-induced or unsafe abortions. According to the nonpartisan state Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO), however, “studies of similar laws in other states suggest that the effect of this measure on the birth rate for California minors would be limited, if any.” Were it to result in a decrease in abortions in the state, the LAO observed, that might be offset by out-of-state abortions. The nearby states of Oregon and Nevada have no legal restrictions.
David O. Weber researched and wrote this article.
