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February 2, 2024By Caroline de Sury
PARIS (OSV News) -- France is one step closer to enshrining the right to abortion in its constitution after the French National Assembly passed a bill Jan. 30 that will now move to the Senate for debate and a vote. If approved, a special body composed of both chambers of the parliament will meet again for its adoption.
France will become the first country in the world to include abortion rights in its constitution if the bill becomes law.
The bill "is a direct consequence" of the U.S. Supreme Court's reversal of Roe v. Wade in June 2022, said Caroline Roux, director of the international branch of Alliance Vita, France's leading association that works on bioethical issues and promotes alternatives to abortion.
"In France, pro-abortion movements saw the revocation of Roe v. Wade as a threat," she said. "They therefore lobbied for the right to abortion to be enshrined in the French Constitution."
Gathered at their plenary assembly in Lourdes Nov. 3-8, 2023, the French bishops criticized the proposal to include the "freedom to have an abortion" in the French Constitution.
In an online post Oct. 28, French President Emmanuel Macron said that "in 2024, the right of women to choose abortion will become irreversible." This followed a promise Macron made March 8, International Women's Day, which was seen as a response to the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022.
The government's bill aims to amend Article 34 of the Constitution to make the possibility of abortion "irreversible" in France. After the Senate vote takes place in February and the measure passes, it will be then go to the French Congress, a special body composed of both chambers of parliament. A three-fifths majority vote in the latter body is needed for the bill to amend the constitution.
France's government, which supports legal abortion, would like the bill to pass ahead of International Women's Day on March 8. France's Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said Jan. 30 the vote is "a great victory for women's rights," while Gender Equality Minister Aurore Bergé called it "historic."
"We have a duty to press on. For our mothers who fought. For our daughters, so that they never have to fight again," Bergé wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
The bill's passage is not guaranteed, especially since the president of the Senate, Gérard Larcher, has publicly stated that he is not in favor of it.
Larcher, who is a second-highest-ranking official in the order of precedence in the French Constitution told France Info national radio Jan. 23 that "abortion is not under threat in our country" and that "if it were threatened, I would fight to maintain it." "I am giving you a very personal opinion," he added. "In all conscience, I think that the constitution is not a catalog of social and societal rights."
Since 1975, women have had a legal right to terminate their pregnancy in France. The late Simone Veil, who served as France's health minister in several governments and is considered a godmother of French "abortion rights" called the Veil Act, always claimed that "no woman resorts to an abortion with a light heart" and that it is "always a tragedy." Since 2012, abortion procedures have been fully reimbursed by social security.
In 2022, there were over 234,000 abortions for 723,000 births in France, the highest number of abortions since 1990, and the highest number among European Union countries -- a "sad record," wrote the bishops in November. "This dramatic reality goes beyond the mere question of a right for women" and "is not progress."
"Our society should see it above all as a sign of its failure to educate, accompany and provide social, economic and human support to those who need it," they added.
Abortion is free of charge, allowed up to 14 weeks of pregnancy and far from being called into question. But the reasons women choose abortion are rarely debated in France, said pro-life expert Roux.
"In France today, abortion is a taboo issue," she pointed out. "It is very difficult to have a debate on the topic." For its part, Alliance Vita is developing a program to listen to women faced with unexpected pregnancies and to provide them with assistance.
"The reality of social emergencies is that not all women have abortions freely and by choice," she told OSV News. "It is a fact that women on the lowest incomes have more recourse to abortion than those who are better off. Many women need protection from the social, economic and family pressures they face."
"Women often express their fear of telling their partner that they are pregnant, when the pregnancy was unexpected," Roux added. "For 40% of the 201,000 women affected by domestic violence each year in France, the violence began during their first pregnancy."
"We have to work upstream, on the root causes that lead women to have abortions," Roux explained. "We need in France an impartial study into the reasons and the conditions of abortion. This could form the basis of a prevention policy providing real support for women, enabling them to avoid a large number of personal tragedies."
Roux, however, is worried that "the inclusion of the 'freedom to abort' in the constitution will have a strong symbolic impact if it goes ahead."
"Will it still be possible to build a prevention policy if abortion is enshrined as a 'constitutional freedom'?" she asked.