We strongly disagree with your statement that The Child Custody Protection Act would not place new restrictions on the availability of abortions to minors (Editorial, July 14). A pregnant girl living in a state with parental notification requirements, who did not feel comfortable informing her parents of her predicament, would have no means of getting across state lines to obtain abortion services under the provisions of this act. This is certainly a new restriction for these young women.
Parental notification laws seem to place the parents’ interests above those of their daughters. For a girl with very controlling parents, notification laws result in only one “option”–that which her parents choose for her. Whether she is forced to keep the baby or to have an abortion, her right to choose has been violated.
What we don’t need are laws that could result in more young girls, who are too scared to talk to their parents, concealing their pregnancies and abandoning their newborns in a Dumpster or in the bushes.
