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The Nicaraguan Abortion Ban: Killing in Defense of Life, 87 N.C NORTH CAROLINA LAW REVIEW Volume 87 | Number 2 Article 5 1-1-2009 The icN araguan Abortion Ban: Killing in Defense of Life Sarah Helena Lord Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/nclr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Sarah H. Lord, The Nicaraguan Abortion Ban: Killing in Defense of Life, 87 N.C. L. Rev. 537 (2009). Available at: http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/nclr/vol87/iss2/5 This Comments is brought to you for free and open access by Carolina Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in North Carolina Law Review by an authorized administrator of Carolina Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Nicaraguan Abortion Ban: Killing in Defense of Life* INTRO D U CTIO N ....................................................................................... 538 1. BACKGROUND ON NICARAGUA: CATHOLICISM, MARIANISMO, AND POLITICAL POSTURING ............................ 544 A . The PoliticalBackdrop ......................................................... 545 B. The Role of Catholicism in Latin America and N icaragua............................................................................... 552 C. Marianismo and Cultural Conceptions of Women's R ights ...................................................................................... 556 II. BACKGROUND ON THE BLANKET BAN ..................................... 558 A. A Discussion of Past and Present Law: From Restriction to Dogm atism ..................................................... 558 B. Questions of Means and Ends: Inherent Problems with the Blanket A bortion Ban ..................................................... 561 III. DOMESTIC REMEDIES: AN ANALYSIS OF DOMESTIC SOURCES OF SUPPORT FOR THE BAN AND SOURCES OF O PPO SITIO N .................................................................................. 564 A . Opp osition .............................................................................. 564 B. Sources of PoliticalSupport: The Executive and Legislative Branches and Their Influence on the Court..... 566 C. The Court and the Problem of Implied Rights: A ConstitutionalChallenge in a Civil Law Country- Arguments and Counterarguments...................................... 567 D. Ad-Hoc Domestic Solutions: Abortion Tourism and B lack M arkets ........................................................................ 572 IV. THE ROLE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW ........................................ 574 A. Discussion of InternationalIntervention: Form and Substance ................................................................................ 574 B. Step One-Framingthe Issue ............................................... 575 C. Step Two-The Potentiality of a Human Rights Based Intervention ............................................................................ 579 1. Hard and Soft Power Solutions: The Leveraging of Aid and the Potential Use of Sanctions ........................ 580 2. Critique of Power-Based Interventions in the Latin American Context and the Role of the United States .................................................................................582 V. TREATY LAw-A WORKABLE SOLUTION ............................... 586 * Copyright © 2009 by Sarah Helena Lord. NORTH CAROLINA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 87 A. Regional Agreements Bolstered by Universal Rights ......... 586 B. InterpretingNicaragua's Obligations: Respecting the Right to Life Under Treaty Law ........................................... 587 C. The Use of Regional Agreements: Defining Rights with Specificity and Shaping the Definition of the Right to L ife .......................................................................................... 590 D. The Use of Broader MultilateralRights Treaties: The Utility of Broader Treaties and Supporting Rights ............. 592 1. Protections of the Right to Life ..................................... 593 2. Protections of the Right to Liberty and to Security of the P erson .................................................................... 597 3. Protections of the Right to Gender Equity .................. 598 4. Protections of the Right to Health ................................ 600 5. The Right to be Free from Torture or Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment ............................... 604 6. Protections of the Right to Control Reproduction ...... 605 7. Protections of Privacy Rights ......................................... 606 E. Limits of Multilateral Treaties: A Case Study of CEDAW and the NicaraguanBlanket Ban ........................ 607 VI. CHOOSING A FORUM-APPLYING TREATY LAW ................... 610 A. The Domestic Exhaustion of Remedies and the Inter- American Court of Human Rights ....................................... 610 B. Procedure: Domestic Exhaustion of Remedies .................. 611 C. Scope of the Court'sJurisdiction .......................................... 613 D. A H ypothetical Ruling .......................................................... 614 C O N CLU SIO N ........................................................................................... 617 INTRODUCTION While many Americans may be unfamiliar with the state of reproductive policies in Nicaragua and more broadly around the world, the abortion debate is nonetheless domestically familiar both politically and socially. As it is in the United States, abortion is a highly provocative and emotionally charged topic in Nicaragua.1 It has also been a highly polarizing debate in both countries.2 But while 1. "Abortion is a ... problematic issue, still extremely divisive" in Nicaragua. Becoming Visible Women in Nicaragua, REVISTA ENVio, Dec. 1987, available at http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/3183. 2. This polarization is evidenced by the stereotyping that occurs. See, e.g., The 700 Club (CBN television broadcast Aug. 16, 2005), available at http://mediamatters.org/items/ 200508170006 (quoting Pat Robertson as saying, "Who are [sic] leading the charge for abortions? So often, you'll find people who are lesbians leading the fight for the destruction of human life."). A popular stereotype of pro-life activists is that they are all religious fanatics. Cf Dean Barnett, Op-Ed., I'm Pro-Life, but Not Religious, BOSTON 2009] NICARAGUAN ABORTION BAN the social climate has been similarly divisive in both the United States and Nicaragua, the policy outcomes have been decidedly dissimilar. As a result of the American antagonistic and divisive social background, U.S. abortion policy has emerged as a delicately worded, cost-benefit assessment of motherhood based on medical precepts.3 On the other hand, Nicaragua has retained a much stronger conservative stance on abortion.4 For more than one hundred years, Nicaraguan law5 only allowed for termination of pregnancy when the mother's health was at risk.6 Then, in 2006, the Nicaraguan legislature repealed the exception for the mother's health, known as the "therapeutic abortion exception," thereby instituting a blanket ban on abortion (hereinafter "the blanket ban").7 Since the blanket ban's inception, maternal mortality rates have risen over one hundred percent in Nicaragua.8 In 2007, the GLOBE, May 21, 2007, at A9 (characterizing the notion that pro-life advocates base their abortion opinion on religious beliefs as an "often erroneous stereotype"). In Nicaragua, during the debates over the abortion ban, "Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC) Deputies Wilfredo Navarro and Freddy Torres described the protesters [against the ban] as lesbians and murderers." NicaNet, Nicaragua Network and Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign Send Letter to Nicaraguan Officials on Abortion Ban, http://www.nicanet.org/?p=444 (last visited Dec. 26, 2008). 3. See Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 160-66 (1973) (using viability as a medically determined definition of when life begins); Doe v. Bolton, 410 U.S. 179, 192 (1973) (defining when an abortion is necessary for doctors by stating it "is a professional judgment that ... may be exercised in the light of all 'factors-physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman's age-relevant to the well-being of the patient.' All these factors may relate to health. This allows the attending physician the room he needs to make his best medical judgment."). 4. See infra notes 135-41 and accompanying text. See generally Frances Raday, Culture, Religion and Gender, 1 INT'L J. CONST. L. 663 (2003) (analyzing the intersection between religion, law, and conceptions of women's rights). 5. See Angela Heimburger & Lance Lattig, For Nicaraguans,International Women's Day Marks a Step Back, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH, Mar. 8, 2008, http://hrw.org/english/ docs/2008/03/12/nicaral8276.htm (explaining that the exception to the ban had been in place for over 130 years). 6. C6digo Penal, libro II, tit. I, Delitos Contra las Personas y su Integridad Fisica, Psiquica, Moral y Social, Capitulo V, Del Aborto, art. 165 [Penal Code, Book II, Title I, Crimes Against Peoples and Their Physical, Psychic, Moral and Social Integrity, Chapter 5, On Abortion, Article 165] (repealed 2006) (Nicar.) (translation by author), available at http://www.unifr.ch/ddpl/derechopenal/legislacion/l_20080616_65.pdf; see Ley No. 603, 26 Oct. 2006, Ley de Derogaci6n al Artfculo 165 del C6digo Penal Vigente [Law Revoking Article 165 of the Penal Code in Force], La Gaceta [L.G.], 17 Nov. 2006 (Nicar.) (translation by author), available at http://legislacion.asamblea.gob.ni/Normaweb.nsf/ ($All)/CB461294F9939E56062572340070AAE9?OpenDocument [hereinafter The
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