How artificial wombs could provide an acceptable replacement for abortion -- depending on who controls them

 The title of this post more or less summarizes the starting point for my latest near-future novel, Donation.

I almost published this book a couple of years ago. I decided against it because it focuses on the misuse of artificial womb technology, and I didn't want to give the impression that I opposed the development of such technology (or of new technologies in general). I did some rewriting to make clearer, I hope, that I was warning about why we should hesitate to give control of large numbers of unborn children to government, especially to centralized government.

Until the leak of a draft of the Dobbs opinion, I didn't really think we'd see the demise of Roe v. Wade any time soon. Yet here we are. So the book has ended up being pretty timely. And I want to say again -- to emphasize -- that if we don't fall into the trap this book describes, prenatal incubators that can shelter and nourish fetuses and even embryos could be a way for women in "red" states to retain, or regain, their reproductive freedom. 

No solution is perfect, including this one. Some women would be haunted by the thought that a child of theirs was out there somewhere, and worry about that child's well-being (unless some sort of followup was allowed). But some women find themselves regretting an abortion. If I were still in my reproductive years and unable to raise the child I was carrying, I would much rather chose the incubator, if I could.

A few thoughts about Roe v Wade and its demise, from a lawyer long interested in constitutional law

 A brief introduction, for those who've previously seen me post about novels and picture books: I'm also a lawyer with a decades-long interest in constitutional law. Before I started using this blog as a way to tell people about my books, I most often wrote on legal and political topics.

And now, I'm reverting to that subject matter to share a few thoughts about the Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

This event -- Roe being overturned -- vindicates the wisdom of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who noted the shaky legal (constitutional) basis of Roe and regretted that a political trend toward legalizing abortion had been interrupted by it. (And yes, in my view and according to many legal scholars and commentators, irrespective of their views on abortion, Roe had a shaky legal basis indeed.)That isn't to say some states wouldn't have continued prohibiting abortion right up to the present day, but we wouldn't have had decades of posturing for political benefit by people -- on each side -- who didn't have to face up to the reality behind the positions.

Also, if not for Roe, it's conceivable that some case(s) would have established a more solid constitutional basis for abortion rights. (See more on a related possibility below.) Theoretically, that could still happen -- the new Dobbs opinions could be distinguishable, in that no one involved in Dobbs made such alternate arguments. But I find it hard to imagine the Court bringing chaos to state abortion law again any time soon.

We may, however, see such alternate constitutional arguments made for other "privacy"/"substantive due process" rights such as gay marriage and parental decision-making authority. As for whether that will be necessary, I'm at least a little skeptical of the majority opinion's protestations that no such other rights are involved. As the Dobbs majority opinion notes, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which reaffirmed Roe nineteen years later, relied on substantive due process. The cases recognizing gay marriage, parental decision-making rights, use of contraceptives, et cetera also shelter under that umbrella, in whole or in part. (Brief detour for legal explanation: the Fourteenth Amendment forbids states to "deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." This language has been stretched to include substantive rights, unrelated to procedure and not listed in the Bill of Rights or elsewhere in the Constitution, under the rubric "substantive due process," something of an oxymoron.)

Why do I doubt the majority's assertion that a decision on abortion, unique in destroying a potential human life, will have no repercussions for these other cases? Because the Dobbs decision doesn't actually rest on the fact that abortion destroys a potential human life. It does rely on various historical data specific to abortion -- but I consider it plausible to predict that future cases involving these other rights will, in examining comparable historical evidence, conclude that some or all of those rights are similarly without adequate constitutional foundation. I am not saying that will happen -- I haven't researched such history. But I don't entirely credit the way the majority brushes aside the possibility.

Justice Thomas's concurring opinion points out an important caveat. There may be other provisions, either in the Constitution as originally ratified or in one or more amendments, that could provide a basis for rights originally justified as aspects of substantive due process. Thomas mentions the Privileges or Immunities Clause, also part of the Fourteenth Amendment. He's consistently called attention to this clause over the years, so I doubt he's mentioning it simply as a hypothetical option.

Finally, on a less legalistic note, I'm glad to see that some anti-abortion activists are trying to make options and resources other than abortion widely available to pregnant women and to mothers, and aren't necessarily festooning such options and resources with religious slogans or indoctrination.

Official Release Day for near-future SF novel DONATION -- with one more excerpt

 It's the "release day" for Donation! That means that the Ingram Group, which handles distribution of the paperback edition to everyone except Amazon (where I put it up separately), has switched the book's status from "preorder" to "available." You can now order the paperback from such retailers as Barnes & Noble. If your local bricks-and-mortar store isn't carrying it, you can ask them to order it in.

Of course, the Kindle and paperback editions are still on Amazon.

I'm celebrating by posting one more excerpt. This one's from the point of view of Adam Brown, one of the adoptive parents the Bureau of Reproductive Safety has chosen to adopt Toni's child. It's perhaps unusually lively for an account of a lawyer preparing clients for a deposition. (A deposition is the pretrial examination of a witness who may or may not be called at trial, made under oath, but rarely in an actual courtroom.)

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When they had served their time in the waiting room and a receptionist admitted them to Mr. Voxsmith’s office, the lawyer immediately led them to a conference room whose furnishings struck Adam as unusual. The table was smooth, polished wood, an elegant oval, but the chairs were straight-backed wood with no arms and less than ample seats. Mr. Voxsmith waited until they had seated themselves, rather gingerly in Adam’s case, before he explained. “The plaintiff’s lawyer may decide to make you uncomfortable. I didn’t want it to take you by surprise, and you can practice ignoring it.”

Adam practiced ignoring the chair while the lawyer ran through some basic instructions. Common sense, mostly: don’t volunteer information; don’t answer unless you know the answer of your own knowledge; don’t guess what a question means; don’t lose your temper; tell the truth. As to that last, Mr. Voxsmith elaborated. “If you try to color the facts, let alone outright lie, then you have to remember what you said. That’s hard when you’re nervous, and lawyers are very good at making people nervous. And unless you’re habitual liars, lying is emotionally exhausting, especially if you have to do it over and over. And if you get caught — well, to use the precise legal phrase, you’re toast.

“Let’s move on from physical discomfort to other sorts. I’m going to start with some personal questions. I’ll point at whichever of you should answer — we’ll save time by skipping the Mr. This and Ms. That. Ready? Here we go.”

The lawyer pointed at Grace. “How long did you try to conceive naturally before giving up?” Then he looked not at Grace but at Adam, assessing his reaction. Adam had shifted in his chair and clenched one fist. The lawyer lifted an eloquent eyebrow; Adam forced himself to sit still with hands open on his lap.

Meanwhile Grace had started answering the question. “We tried for four years. But really, we’ve never stopped trying.”

Mr. Voxsmith, to Adam’s astonishment, took a kazoo out of his pocket and blew on it twice. “This is my buzzer. When you hear it, you know you screwed up somehow. Ms. Allen, you made two mistakes. You contradicted yourself, and you gave the enemy some ammunition. You wouldn’t necessarily find that out until the trial, when you’re on the stand and opposing counsel brings up that statement in cross-examination, asking why you’re insisting on seizing this poor woman’s baby if you haven’t given up on your efforts to conceive.”

Grace gulped and said, “What should I have said, then?”

The lawyer wagged his finger. “No, no. I can’t tell you what to say. That’s coaching the witness.” He turned toward Adam. “Mr. Brown, do you have any suggestions?”

Adam thought for a moment. “She could say that we tried for four years before deciding it just wasn’t going to happen. That’s true, even though we can’t help hoping a little bit anyway.”

The lawyer did not reply; apparently, the absence of a kazoo blast was sufficient approval. He pointed at Adam next. “Describe the methods you used in your attempt to conceive naturally.”

Adam couldn’t help staring. “Can they really ask me that?”

“They might. That or something else equally obnoxious. Partly in the hope of throwing you off balance. So — give.”

Adam gritted his teeth, then had to relax his jaw to answer. “Once we decided we needed help, we used two positions recommended by our fertility specialist.”

The finger stayed pointed at Adam. “Did you get a second opinion?”

“Ah — no.” As Adam opened his mouth to say more, out came the kazoo again. BLAT!

“Don’t guess at a followup question and then try to answer it.” Now it was Grace’s turn again. “What percentage of your annual income did you spend on your effort to conceive during those four years?”

Grace was good with numbers, both remembering them and calculating them. “Approximately fifteen percent.” How should Adam answer the same question? “I don’t know,” probably. Except now he did — he trusted Grace. But no, he wasn’t supposed to answer out of anything but firsthand knowledge.

Still Grace’s turn. “And what is that annual income?”

Adam blinked at Grace’s answer. Were they really doing that well?

Back to Adam. “Did you consider spending more?”

Had they? “I don’t remember.”

No kazoo. Good. Here came the next question, for Grace. And a gleam in the lawyer’s eye suggested it would be the nastiest one yet. “When you applied to adopt, did you anticipate that you would be depriving an unwilling mother of her baby?”

Grace’s eyes went wide in distress. The lawyer blew a short, somehow softer note on the kazoo. “Of course you didn’t, and there’s no need to hesitate. You can just say a businesslike ‘no.’ Remember the plaintiff, the donor, was willing. She’s not claiming anyone ambushed her and drugged her. She came in of her own accord, signed the papers voluntarily, lay on a table in a procedure room instead of jumping up and running out.”

He looked back and forth between the two of them. “Getting tired? Well, we’ve only just started. So the night before the real thing, get plenty of rest. Eat hearty, if you can, the morning of the deposition, but nothing that’ll upset your stomach. And wear comfortable clothes. We want you focused, not distracted. Focused, but as close to relaxed as possible. If there are activities that help you relax, plan on doing them the night before or even that morning.”

Adam started to fight the smile that came, and then decided not to bother. He turned to Grace and winked. “I think we can manage that.”

A smile lit her face, and she winked back. The lawyer waited ten whole seconds before interrupting them, kazoo at the ready. “Back to work.”

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And here, one more time, is my favorite 3D mockup of the cover (from KAM Design).