Michael Barone gives a state-by-state breakdown of abortion rates. He concludes that there is a pretty strong correlation between the way a state votes and its abortion rates, with liberal states having lots of abortions and conservative states having fewer. That may seem obvious, and yet other correlations break down, with conservative states often having higher divorce rates than liberal states:
Roe v. Wade imposed the same legal abortion regime on the entire nation and made abortion a national political issue. Yet Americans in different regions and states have in effect established very different behavioral abortion regimes. Abortion is very common in New York (abortion rate of 38.2) and New Jersey (34.3), only about half as common in Illinois (18.9) and Texas (17.3), and lower in South Carolina (7.9) and Utah (6.4). Cultural liberals have noted that divorce rates are relatively low in some politically liberal states like Massachusetts and relatively high in some politically conservative states like Oklahoma. But abortion rates seem highly correlated with cultural attitudes and with, at least during the time that abortion has been a major political issue, voting behavior.
What are we to conclude from this? That abortion makes for happier marriages? That divorced women are refusing to get abortions? Or what?
HT: Joe Carter
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