Poll: 81 percent in U.S. want abortion limits

WASHINGTON—A new national survey shows an overwhelming majority of Americans support significant safety restrictions on abortion.

“What we found is a consensus of Americans who find abortion to be morally wrong and ultimately harmful to women,” said Patrick Kelly, a vice president for the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal benefits organization that commissioned the survey.

Each year since 2008, the Knights of Columbus has commissioned an abortion survey with the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. This year, Marist found 81 percent of Americans only support abortion in cases of rape, incest, to save the life of the mother, and in the first three months of pregnancy. Researchers also found 60 percent view abortion as morally wrong—including one-third of respondents who identify as pro-choice.

Kelly said traditional labels do not represent Americans’ nuanced views on abortion. Labeling Americans in one of two camps—pro-life or pro-choice—ignores the broad swath of public agreement in the middle.

“The idea that the pro-choice label is somehow monolithic and somehow stands for support of an abortion any time during a pregnancy simply does not match the data,” said Andrew Walther, a Knights of Columbus spokesman.

The survey found only 12 percent of Americans support abortion on demand at any stage of pregnancy.

In the last five years, states enacted more than 280 pro-life laws, according to Family Research Council data—and activists are building momentum at the federal level. In 2013 and 2015, the U.S. House passed a bill protecting babies from abortion after 20 weeks, but the legislation stalled in the Senate.

Kelly said the polling research reveals what is beneath the surface of America’s attitude toward abortion.

Americans agree abortions do women more harm than good, according to the poll. More than half of all respondents said abortions are harmful to women, and only 52 percent of self-identified pro-choicers said abortion improves the life of the mother.

Seventy-seven percent of Americans—including 71 percent of pro-choice respondents—believe legislation can protect the health and well-being of both the mother and the life of the unborn child.

Marist conducted its poll in November, gathering data through telephone interviews of nearly 1,700 adults 18 years of age or older. Each call used a live interviewer and surveyed respondents in both English and Spanish. Barbara Carvalho, director of the survey, said the sample accurately represents American demographics. And the poll did not appear skewed by the undercover videos released last summer by the Center for Medical Progress showing abortion giant Planned Parenthood profited from organs harvested from aborted babies.

“There is a stability to the attitude of people towards the issue,” she said. “The questions we asked give a measurement that’s not reactive to any one particular circumstance, but rather give us a sense of what Americans’ opinions are.”