Opinion

Extremists should not decide future of Texas Abortion power play is a full-on attack on the rights of women

The 2013 fights in both special sessions of the Texas Legislature have drawn the eyes of the nation, not the just the eyes of Texas. That's because no one expected thousands of ordinary Texans to stand in public opposition to Gov. Rick Perry and the elected officials who have grown all too comfortable with legislating from political extremes.

This time was different.

Expect it not to be the last.

Unlike 2011, when the Legislature mandated a transvaginal ultrasound be performed 24 hours prior to an abortion and few seemed to notice, this time the proposed omnibus legislation was a clear and full-on attack on women's rights and a woman's access to safe and legal abortion.

This time, the majority of ordinary Texas women and men spoke up in huge numbers, saying they know why abortion procedures, providers and facilities had been put in the crosshairs: to gain Rick Perry and David Dewhurst their sought-after tea party-cred, the help they need to win their party's primaries.

This legislation - and the undemocratic manner in which it was pushed through the House and Senate - made it crystal clear that the extreme minority was successfully imposing its will on the majority of Texans. This was about power.

And in the face of so much unexpected, vocal opposition, the legislative majority decided not simply to carb-load for primary season, but to dope as well. Not only are they running roughshod over women's health care, they have dismissed female legislators, cut off debate, changed votes and times, told hearing witnesses who have traveled the length and breadth of this great state that their testimony is repetitious - all the while insisting they represent the majority of Texans.

They don't. And that will be clear at the voting booth in the future.

A statewide, bipartisan poll conducted in the early days of the first special session showed that 80 percent of registered voters do not want abortion raised during the special legislative session; instead, 71 percent say the legislators should focus on the economy and jobs.

The survey, conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research and Chesapeake Beach Consulting, reflected the Texas electorate: 49 percent self-identified as Republicans and 37 percent called themselves Democrats.

The pollsters reported that nearly three quarters of voters (74 percent) in the state say personal, private medical decisions about whether to have an abortion should be made by a woman, her family, and her doctor - not by politicians; just 19 percent of voters think government has a right and an obligation to pass restrictions on abortion. Support for a woman's ability to make decisions on abortion for herself is both broad and deep, including among Independents (76 percent) and Republicans (61 percent).

Put simply, there is no majority will for more restrictions on abortion. Legislators who support such legislation already know that. They have no reason to care at the moment, because of the voting patterns of the last 20 years.

Texas ranks lowest in voter turnout in the entire nation: 36 percent of registered voters went to the polls in 2012. And the legislative majority would like that number to be even less, because when it is, they win.

Happily for us, the majority's behavior these past 45 days has virtually guaranteed a voting surge. And a majority of Texans will not allow an extremist minority to decide the future of Texas.

The 750 people who showed up in Austin to testify at the June 20 House committee hearing in the first special session won't stand for it.

The 4,000 who filled the Capitol on June 25 when Sen. Wendy Davis' filibuster was cut short by cheating won't stand for it.

The 7,500 who poured out across the Capitol lawn on July 1, the first day of the second special session, won't stand for it.

The nearly 3,800 who registered at Monday's Austin Senate hearing won't stand for it.

The hundreds who showed up at Discovery Green late Tuesday to welcome state Sens. Wendy Davis and Kirk Watson won't stand for it.

By January 2015, when the Legislature reconvenes, this stand with Texas women will have grown into a stand for Texas - a stand for the majority of Texans who disagree with this abuse of power.

When that occurs, the eyes of Texas and the nation will look back to the summer of 2013 and proudly say: That was our Texas Spring.

Terri Burke is executive director of the ACLU of Texas.