Obama vs. McCain: Progressive Voter Guide to Reproductive Justice and Gender

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In 1916, Margaret Sanger opened the first birth control clinic in the United States. Just 10 days later, the clinic closed and Sanger was arrested. It took seven years of court battles before she was able to open another clinic, 20 years before the United States stopped classifying information about birth control as obscene, and another 36 years before the Supreme Court extended the right of privacy to include the use of contraceptives outside of marriage. Today, virtually every woman (98 percent) who has ever had sexual intercourse has relied on some form of contraception. Yet that right, along with so many other hard-fought gains (reproductive choice, equal pay for equal work, gender equity in education), is under assault.

The list of setbacks is as depressing as it is long: A growing number of pharmacists is refusing to fill birth control prescriptions, the Department of Health and Human Services is trying covertly to redefine contraception as abortion, Roe v. Wade is on the brink of being reversed, equal pay for equal work has never been fully realized, women's sports continue to be underfunded, domestic violence is routinely ignored, and on and on.

At the same time, the past two years have seen big gains and historic firsts for women in politics: Nancy Pelosi was sworn in as the first female speaker of the house, Sen. Hillary Clinton came within a hair's breadth of being the first female presidential nominee for a major political party, and now the Republican Party carries a woman -- Gov. Sarah Palin -- on its ticket for the first time. Unfortunately, Palin's support of abstinence-only sex education programs and recent troubling statements on forcing sexual assault victims to bear their rapists' children raise serious questions about her views on reproductive justice and gender.

Whether women's rights continue on their downward trajectory depends in large part on the next president, and the differences between Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain are not small. To help you determine which candidate's positions most closely match your own, we've put together an election guide, summarizing voting records and public statements on a range of issues from equal pay to abortion.

1. REPRODUCTIVE CHOICE

Roe v. Wade, the 1973 landmark Supreme Court decision that allowed women the right to safe, legal abortion, is under threat of being overturned. A 2007 Quinnipiac poll shows that 62 percent of Americans support Roe. The legislation's fate is largely in the hands of the next U.S. president, who will be in a position to nominate several new Supreme Court justices, as six of the nine sitting justices will be over 70 on Jan. 20, 2009. A restacking of the court could mean the end of Roe.

• Solutions: Electing a pro-choice, progressive president is the surest safeguard against dismantling reproductive freedoms, including abortion.
• Obama's position: Obama supports a woman's right to choose and says he would make preserving Roe a priority. Obama supports late-term abortions when medically necessary and is open to receiving advice from reproductive rights groups on legislation.
• McCain's position: John McCain says he thinks Roe needs to be overturned and would fight vigorously to make that happen. McCain thinks abortion should be decided individually, state by state. He then recommends that anti-choice grassroots groups build momentum and dismantle abortion rights at the state level. It is also worth noting that McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin, also opposes abortion, even in cases of rape and incest.
• Learn more: RH Reality Check, NARAL Pro-Choice America, The Guttmacher Institute

2. CONTRACEPTION

Birth control is basic health care. And education about and access to affordable contraception is one of the surest ways to prevent unintended pregnancies. Yet some forms of contraception have been under assault, as the Department of Health and Human Services has been working covertly to redefine contraception as abortion.