ABORTION ACCESS:

U.S. Public opinion nationwide polls: Year 2004

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2004-AP/Ipsos poll:

The Associated Press commissioned Ipsos Public Affairs to conduct a national poll on 2004-NOV-19 to 21 on abortion access. They found that 59% of American adults supported the U.S. Supreme Court Roe v. Wade ruling of 1973 which allows abortion for any reason during the first trimester, when about 90% of abortions are performed. WorldNetDaily criticized the poll on 2004-DEC-02 because they felt that the preamble to the question asked might have biased the answer in favor of the pro-choice position. The preamble stated that: "The 1973 Supreme Court ruling called Roe v. Wade made abortion in the first three months of pregnancy legal." In reality, the court decision:

Americans tend to approve of earlier abortions more readily that late-term abortions. By implying that Roe v. Wade only had an impact on the legality of early abortions, the pollsters may have biased the results in favor of the pro-choice position and artificially increased the result.

On 2004-DEC-3 to 5, Ipsos conducted another, almost identical, poll. This simply stated that Roe v. Wade "made abortion legal." This wording might be interpreted by some subjects as implying that Roe v. Wade made abortion legal at all stages of pregnancy. The pollsters may have biased the results in favor of the pro-life position and artificially reduced the result. The poll showed that 57% favored Roe v. Wade.

One might conclude that if a properly stated question were asked of American adults, the "true" figure of support for Roe v. Wade would be between 57% and 59%. ₁

ABC News/Washington Post Poll:

This was taken on 2004-DEC-16 to 19. They asked 1,004 randomly selected American adults the question: "Do you think abortion should be legal in all cases, legal in most cases, illegal in most cases, or illegal in all cases?"

Results:

Margin of error was ±3% percentage points. It is notable that 17% of American adults would totally prohibit all abortions, including those needed to save the life of the mother. ₂

General Social Survey for 2004:

This is an extensive survey conducted almost yearly by the National Opinion Research Center. One area studied is abortion access. ₃ One question was:

"Please tell me whether or not you think it should be possible for a pregnant woman to obtain a legal abortion if the woman's own health is seriously endangered by the pregnancy:

References:

1. Sarah Kupelian, "AP, pollsters stonewall over bogus abortion poll. NARAL trumpets results of misleading survey claiming 59% of Americans favor Roe v. Wade," WorldNetDaily, 2005-JAN-19, at: http://worldnetdaily.com/
2. "Abortion and birth control," PollingReport.com, at: http://www.pollingreport.com/
3. "Support abortion to protect woman," [sic] The Association of Religion Data Archives, at: http://thearda.com/

Copyright © 2005 & 2006, by Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance
Latest update: 2006-NOV-15
Author: B.A. Robinson