This is a measure called for for a long time by feminist associations. The bill including voluntary termination of pregnancy (abortion) in the Constitution is presented this Tuesday to the Council of Ministers.
According to the explanatory memorandum of the draft constitutional law (PJLC), it will ultimately be the “guaranteed freedom” of women to resort to abortion which will appear in the fundamental law, rather than the “right to abortion” which was favored by women’s rights activists.
The shock of American retreat
The question of including the right to abortion in the Constitution resurfaced in 2022 after the annulment of the ruling guaranteeing the United States the right to abortion throughout the country. This measure had the effect of an electric shock in many countries, particularly in France.
“The freedoms recognized for women, which we thought in some way impossible to roll back, are called into question by political movements, sometimes by leaders who come to power, by case law which changes, depending on the political balance », Underlined Emmanuel Macron on Sunday on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. “This is why France is pleased to set an example by including in its constitution the freedom of women to resort to voluntary termination of pregnancy,” he added.
In fact, the inclusion of the recourse to abortion in the Constitution – a recourse currently recognized in an ordinary law – is above all “symbolic”, recognizes the Elysée. Its inclusion in the Basic Law would complicate attempts to remove it or seriously undermine it, but it could still be repealed by a new constitutional revision. In the ranks of feminist associations, we also salute a “strong symbol”.
“Reaffirm which camp France is in”
The inclusion in the Constitution “is not going to change the way in which women resort to abortion in France today, it is not enough to improve things”, underlines the president of the Women’s Foundation Anne- Cécile Mailfert, citing in particular the problems of access to abortion linked to the closure of maternity wards. Nevertheless, “it is important to reaffirm the fundamental nature of this right and to reaffirm which camp France is in,” she adds.
Conversely, the pro-life association Alliance Vita sees this registration as “nonsense” and considers the establishment of a real “abortion prevention policy more necessary than ever”.
Temporarily authorized in 1975 by the Veil law, abortion was definitively legalized in France in December 1979. The law has since been expanded, with a legal period extended to 14 weeks and 100% coverage. According to the latest official figures, 234,300 abortions were recorded in France in 2022.