Does the Iowa Legislature prize Iowans' liberties?
A Letter From Iowan Kelcey Patrick-Ferree
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The Iowa Legislature passed a law to ban abortion in Iowa at six weeks in a special session in July 2023. The law was immediately suspended pending litigation over its constitutionality, and the Iowa Supreme Court is expected to rule on the law’s constitutionality under the Iowa Constitution within the next several months.
What follows is a slightly revised version of the public comment that I submitted when the law was being debated in the Legislature:
I prize my liberty.
Chief Justice Mark Cady understood liberty. In a decision finding that the right to abortion is a fundamental right under the Iowa Constitution, he wrote:
Autonomy and dominion over one’s body go to the very heart of what it means to be free. At stake in this case is the right to shape, for oneself, without unwarranted governmental intrusion, one’s own identity, destiny, and place in the world. Nothing could be more fundamental to the notion of liberty.
Planned Parenthood of the Heartland v. Reynolds ex rel. State, 915 N.W.2d 206 (Iowa 2018).
Nothing. There is nothing in the world that is more fundamental to liberty than bodily autonomy and dominion over one’s body. We recognize this when we recognize the right of a person not to be touched without permission (Iowa Code §708.1(2)(a)). We recognize this when we recognize the right of a person not to be confined against their will (Iowa Code §710.1). We recognize this when we recognize the right of a person to decide what will happen to their corpse — even if that corpse's organs could be used to keep another person alive (Iowa Code §142C.3(4)(d)).
What the Iowa Legislature proposes at present is to take away the right of half of all Iowans to dominion and autonomy over our bodies.
If this bill passes, we will not be able to decide not to be touched for 40 weeks. People already, for some reason, feel free to touch pregnant bellies any time they want to. This bill goes farther: It may instate a legal requirement to subject oneself to a medically unnecessary transvaginal ultrasound to verify the absence of embryonic cardiac impulses in order to get medical care. In any other circumstance, vaginal penetration of a person who does not want to be penetrated would be called what it is: rape. I invite any supporter of this bill who has not had a transvaginal ultrasound to try it out and see if, after the experience, you believe this is not a problem. If you do not have a vagina, other avenues are available.
I have three children, so I know how much touching is involved in pregnancy care: probing and pushing, measuring everything, vaginal exams, IVs, vaccinations and blood draws, monitors strapped to the belly, catheters, needles in the spine. Some of these "touches" are painful, some are dangerous (to say nothing of the birthing process itself). Imagine every single one of those touches and prods and needles being unwanted but unavoidable. And those are just the unwanted touch elements — there are many, many other indignities and dangers of pregnancy that no person should be forced to endure against their will. Not one.
If this bill passes, we will not be able to decide to avoid the confinement of pregnancy for 40 weeks. I have endured early labor, Braxton-Hicks contractions, bed rest, muscle cramps so severe that I could not walk, the ungainliness of a pregnant body and the inability to tie my own shoes. I have affirmatively decided to accept this confinement each time I went through it, and my pregnancies were relatively easy. Imagine every indignity, every physical limitation, every severe pain, every lifelong effect of pregnancy being unwanted and unavoidable.
If this bill passes, we will not be able to decide whether or not our organs will be used to support another life. We will have fewer rights than a corpse. Imagine having fewer rights to bodily autonomy and dominion over one's body than a corpse.
Imagine, as Justice Thomas Waterman wrote, believing “that trash set out in a garbage can for collection is entitled to more … protection than a woman’s interest in autonomy and dominion over her own body.” Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, Inc. v. Reynolds ex rel. State, No. 22-2036 (Iowa 2023).
I prize my liberty. The question is, does the Iowa Legislature prize our liberty, or does it want to give Iowans fewer rights to our living bodies than to our corpses or our garbage left for collection?
Kelcey Patrick-Ferree lives in Iowa City and writes with her husband at www.ourlibertiesweprize.com.
Letters From Iowans is a part of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative. We encourage you, our subscribers, to share your perspective in this column. To make your voice heard, use this form to send us your essay:
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