NEW YORK (BP and local reports) — At least 65% of Americans believe abortion should be illegal in most cases after the first three months of pregnancy, and a full 80% of Americans believe it should be illegal in the final three months of pregnancy, according to an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released a week ago.
Along political party lines, 81% of Democrats and 41% of Republicans surveyed said abortions should be legal in the first trimester in all or most cases. For the second trimester, 52% of Democrats and 11% of Republicans believe abortions should be allowed.
Among those surveyed who identified as born again or evangelical Christians, 67% said abortions should be illegal in all or most cases, while 33% said abortions should be legal in all or most cases. Only one-tenth of born-again and evangelical Christians agreed abortions should be legal in every circumstance.
The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) has advocated for the sanctity of human life for decades. Most recently, messengers to the SBC 2021 Annual Meeting June 15-16 in Nashville adopted two resolutions aimed at protecting the unborn:
— On Taxpayer Complicity In Abortion And The Hyde Amendment. Messengers denounced any attempt to rescind the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funding of abortion.
— On Abolishing Abortion, advocated “abolishing abortion immediately, without exception or compromise.”
Messengers to the 2019 SBC Annual Meeting in Birmingham approved a resolution, On Celebrating The Advancement Of Pro-life Legislation In State Legislatures, which also urged that Roe v. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court case that legalized abortion nationwide for all nine months of gestation, be overturned.
Many states have passed laws restricting abortions after fetal heartbeats can be detected, generally at six weeks, but courts have blocked enforcement. That is presently the case in Mississippi. The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to take up a separate case, Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban, in the fall 2021 session of the court.
In 2018, SBC messengers meeting in Dallas adopted a resolution, On Reaffirming The Full Dignity Of Every Human Being, denouncing “every act of abortion except to save the mother’s physical life.”
The 1,125 adults surveyed in the mid-June poll were drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel designed to be representative of the U.S. population. Among other poll findings:
— 43% of Americans believe abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, compared to 56% who say it should be legal in all or most cases.
— 36% of Republicans said abortions should be legal in all or most cases, while 64% of Republicans said abortions should be illegal in all or most circumstances.
— 76% of Democrats who told pollsters abortions should be legal in all or most cases stood at 76%, while 23% of Democrats said abortion should be illegal in all or most cases.
Most U.S. states allow abortions through 20 weeks or five months of pregnancy, with 20 states only prohibiting abortions at the stage of fetal viability or about six months of pregnancy, according to the Guttmacher Institute. In Virginia, abortions are allowed until the third trimester.
The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points, AP reported. The acronym, NORC, stands for the National Opinion Research Center located at the University of Chicago.
