France enshrines women’s right to abortion in response to US overturning of Roe

French lawmakers yesterday overwhelmingly approved a bill enshrining a woman’s right to an abortion in France’s constitution.

The historic move was designed to prevent the kind of rollback of abortion rights seen in the United States in recent years.

In an exceptional joint session of parliament convened at the Palace of Versailles, the bill was approved in a 780-72 vote.

Abortion enjoys wide support in France across most of the political spectrum, and has been legal since 1975. The vote makes France the first country to have a constitutional right to abortion since the former Yugoslavia inscribed it in its 1974 constitution.

Nearly the entire hall in France stood in a long ovation, and many female legislators in the hall smiled broadly as they cheered.

There were jubilant scenes of celebrations all over France as women’s rights activists hailed the measure promised by President Emmanuel Macron immediately following the Dobbs ruling by the US Supreme Court in 2022.

Both houses of parliament, the National Assembly and the Senate, had already adopted a bill to amend Article 34 of the French Constitution to specify that “the law determines the conditions by which is exercised the freedom of women to have recourse to an abortion, which is guaranteed”.

In the lead-up to the historic vote, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal addressed the 925 lawmakers gathered for the joint session in Versailles, and called on them to make France a leader in women’s rights and set an example in defence of women’s rights for countries around the world.

“We have a moral debt to women,” Attal said.

He paid tribute to Simone Veil, a prominent legislator, former health minister and key feminist who in 1975 championed the bill that decriminalised abortion in France.

“We have a chance to change history,” Attal said in a moving speech. “Make Simone Veil proud,” he said to a standing ovation.

None of France’s major political parties represented in parliament have questioned the right to abortion, including Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party and the conservative Republicans.

However, some lawmakers have voted against inscribing abortion rights into the constitution in previous votes.

Le Pen, who won a record number of seats in the National Assembly two years ago, said yesterday that her party would vote in favour of the bill but added that “there is no need to make this a historic day”.

The right to an abortion has broad

support among the French public.

A recent poll showed support at more than 80 per cent, consistent with previous surveys.

The same poll also showed that a solid majority of people were in favour of enshrining it in the constitution.

The government argued in its introduction to the bill that the right to abortion is threatened in the United States, where the Supreme Court in 2022 overturned a 50-year-old ruling that used to guarantee it.

The decision by the US Supreme

Court to strip women of the right to abortion has reverberated across Europe’s political landscape, forcing the issue back into public debate in France at a time of political upheaval.

Mathilde Philip-Gay, a law professor and a specialist in French and American constitutional law, warned against easing the pressure on legislators for women’s rights as far-right parties — determined to curtail women’s rights — gain political influence and are elected to form governments around Europe and elsewhere.