Teen

Battles over abortion are being waged in an ever-shifting theater of operations. As combat moves from the courts to state legislatures to Congress to the ballot box, one issue is drawing especially heavy firepower: laws that require teenagers to involve their parents in abortion decisions. Forty-one states have enacted laws that prevent minors--generally anyone under age 18--from obtaining abortions unless they either notify their parents or get the consent of one or both parents.*

The issue of teenagers and abortion stems from a problem welcomed by no one: Every year in the United States more than a million girls under age 20--about one in every 10--become pregnant. About 82 percent of these pregnancies are unintended and about 42 percent of them are aborted.[1] The Children's Defense Fund, a Washington advocacy group, estimates that at least 40,000 teenage girls drop out of school every year because of pregnancy.

Though a majority of the public continues to favor a legal right to abortion,** opinion polls indicate the public supports parental involvement in teen abortion decisions by majorities as high as 81 percent. "Parents have a right to be involved in life-and-death decisions such as abortion," says Rep. Christopher H. Smith, R-N.J., a longtime abortion opponent and author of a federal parental notification bill.

Critics say that while parental involvement laws may be well-intentioned, they sometimes force young women to resort to illegal abortions or expose them to abuse from hostile family members. "Parental involvement is ideal, but sometimes it's impossible," says Jane Hodgson, a St. Paul obstetrician whose name is attached to a court case that unsuccessfully challenged a parental notification law in Minnesota. "... We have to face the reality that a teen may encounter violent abuse if she is forced to bring an estranged parent into the process."[2]

It is difficult to separate the debate over parental involvement from the broader and highly emotional issue of abortion. One reason is that the most vocal lobbyists for such laws are anti-abortion activists. Galvanized by a 1989 Supreme Court ruling that upheld state restrictions on abortions and two 1990 decisions affirming the constitutionality of parental involvement laws, the anti-abortion movement has stepped up its lobbying efforts. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 226 abortion-related bills have been introduced this year, 34 of which deal with the issue of parental involvement.

A number of states enacted parental involvement statutes in the 1970s and '80s, but many of them are not being enforced because of court challenges. The laws vary widely in their restrictive-ness. Some require physicians to telephone or write to parents before performing abortions on teenagers. In some states, doctors must wait 24 to 48 hours after alerting the parents before performing the procedure. Some states require written, even notarized, proof of the parents' consent. In some states both parents must give their consent. Some allow one parent to make the decision; others allow the role to be filled by grandparents, clergy or other adults. A growing number of states permit minors to have an abortion without parental involvement if they first appear before a judge, a procedure known as a judicial bypass.

Many politicians would like to avoid the question of parental involvement altogether. The abortion issue is complicated enough, they say, without piling on such delicate questions as the proper role for government in intimate communications between parent and child. Even politicians who generally favor abortion rights may find it difficult to oppose laws that require some parental involvement in such decisions.

"The idea that parents are ultimately responsible for their children is so ingrained that even a pro-choice politician could gain with the electorate" by backing parental involvement laws, says Gary Bauer, president of the Family Research Council in Washington and formerly President Ronald Reagan's domestic affairs adviser.

On the other hand, opponents of such laws can point to a victory last fall indicating strong citizen sentiment that government should stay out of such issues. Last November, Oregon voters rejected a proposed parental notification law that had been garnering strong approval in opinion surveys.

Citizens, legal experts and state and federal legislators are likely to be grappling with abortion and parental involvement issues for the foreseeable future. Here are the central questions on which the outcome will hinge:

Are parental involvement laws needed?

"Mom, Dad, I'm pregnant." The reluctance of teens to pronounce the dreaded words is serious enough without the moral vagaries of abortion. For many girls, the revelation is also a first admission of sexual activity. "They're going to kill me," "My Dad will throw me out" are common reactions among pregnant teens. "It's not the eventual reaction but the initial reaction they're worried about," says Cynthia Waszak, research director for the Center for Population Options in Washington.

Most unmarried teenage girls who become pregnant do tell their parents.* It's the remaining girls who need the protections offered by parental involvement laws, supporters of the laws say. Most teens are too immature to make such decisions on their own, they argue, and the laws encourage parent-child communication.

Backers of parental involvement laws say adolescents tend to underestimate their parents' supportive-ness. The first reaction is usually anger, but when the turmoil subsides, anywhere from two-thirds to four-fifths of parents have been found to be supportive.[3] "Many times, [family members] are forced to communicate because of a crisis and are actually brought together by the very hardship they wished to hide," writes Samona J. Smit, a lobbyist for the Iowa Right to Life Committee.[4]

Opponents of such laws say research does not support the notion that teenagers are too immature to make such an important decision. According to a committee of the American Psychological Association, a teenager's fear of family conflict, lack of experience in dealing with medical professionals and lack of money were much more likely to affect her decision about abortion than was her psychological maturity.[5]

A 1989 study by the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health monitored 360 black teenage girls of similar socioeconomic backgrounds who sought pregnancy tests at Baltimore clinics. Two years later, the study found,