Many expected the overturn of Roe v. Wade in 2022 with the Dobbs decision and subsequent enforcement of pro-life trigger “bans” to be a huge step toward creating a thriving culture of life. Sadly, over three years later, it is clear that the outcome thus far is a more efficient, decentralized system of death.
Despite the closure of many abortion facilities, the number of American children murdered in the womb is steadily rising. This increase is a reality not just nationally but also in the red conservative states that have “banned” abortion.
US abortion totals went from 1.06 million in 2023 to 1.14 million in 2024 to 590,000 in just the first half of 2025. With the consistent month-over-month rate of increase, that number will likely exceed 1.2 million when fully reported. In my home state of Oklahoma, which pro-life outlets and organizations have told us is “abortion-free,” abortions have increased from 5,950 in 2021 to an estimated 7,436 in 2025. Fifty-four percent of those abortions were committed via mail-order abortion pills. Most red states have seen similar increases.
That matters because it exposes the central weakness of the institutional Pro-Life strategy post-Dobbs: it has been provider-centric and method-centric, while the abortion industry has moved to distribution-centric and self-administration-centric. Abolitionists, on the other hand, continue to be moral-centric and justice-centric, obeying Scripture and trusting God for the results. In this article, I plan to show why the mainstream pro-life movement has a futile strategy when it comes to curbing the abortion pill. I will show why abolition is the only answer to this crisis and address some common objections to abolitionism.
Why Abortion is Increasing
But isn’t abortion illegal in pro-life states? Aren’t these black market abortions?
No.
Every pro-life “ban” passed in recent years expressly permits mothers to perform their own abortion. In Oklahoma, ours reads: “This section does not authorize the charging or conviction of a woman with any criminal offense in the death of her own unborn child.” In a world in which self-managed abortion is easily accessible by mail-order pills and other mechanisms, to exclude mothers from laws “banning” abortion is to establish their right to murder their own preborn children. I will say it again, because preborn children cannot afford for you to gloss over this: to exclude mothers from laws “banning” abortion is to establish their right to murder their own preborn children. Abortion is thus still legal in all fifty states.
That is not a technical footnote. That is the whole ballgame. In practical terms, when the state establishes that the principal actor of abortion is immune from legal consequence, abortion is not meaningfully illegal. When the mother is the only party to abortion who can easily be prosecuted, she is the abortionist. If you grant the abortionist immunity, abortion is legal.
So when people ask, “Why is abortion still happening after Dobbs?” part of the answer is simple: because our laws still permit it. As abolitionists are known to say at state capitols, laws to murder babies are written here. States have written legal self-managed abortion into our statutes and then acted shocked when the innocent keep dying.
While pro-life leaders lacked the foresight to see the meteoric rise of self-managed abortion coming, abolitionists have long been sounding the alarm. As one abolitionist put it in 2019, the trigger laws passed to “ban” abortion once Roe was overturned accomplished “nothing but expedite the evolution of the abortion industry.”
It is not simply that telehealth and self-managed abortion have replaced the abortions that would have taken place in clinics; it is that they have increased abortion demand as an impulse buy, but away from anyone’s watching eyes. Self-managed abortions via mail-order pills taken at home are significantly cheaper and more convenient than surgical abortion, in which a woman must drive to a facility, walk past Christians pleading with her not to go in, and undergo an invasive procedure. When surgical abortion was prohibited, the mail-order network rushed in to fill the void, and the result is a more accessible and affordable abortion market. Abortion facilities are like Blockbuster. Mail-order abortion pills are Netflix. The closing of brick-and-mortar movie stores does not mean movies are not being watched.
Simply put, pro-life leaders caught off guard by the increase in abortions did not possess the foresight to see the self-managed abortion revolution coming. Lack of foresight can be forgiven, but much worse than that, thus far, is that they have lacked the conviction to do what must be done about it now. There is only one answer to the problem of self-managed abortion, and they stand in opposition to it.
The Equal Protection Mandate
Equal protection, one of many abolitionist rallying cries, is both a Constitutional requirement and a divine mandate rooted in the character of God. Scripturally, the requirement for justice is clear: we must show no partiality (Deut. 1:16-17; 16:18-20; Lev. 19:15; Prov. 18:5; Exod. 23:2-3). This means we do not allow an individual’s status, influence, or pitiable circumstances to sway the application of justice. Civil magistrates are not authorized by God to decide which image-bearers qualify for legal protection or which murderers receive immunity. They are commanded to judge impartially, applying the law without respect to persons.
The vast majority of pro-life leaders and laws insist that law enforcement and courts judge not the act that was committed (the murder of a child) but the identity of the killer (mother or abortionist) before determining whether the act was legal or illegal. This is the height of absurdity and the definition of partiality. God’s Word, on the other hand, commands us to look at conduct. If the conduct is murder, the law must treat it as such, regardless of who holds the gun . . . or the mail-order pill.
God’s Word not only forbids showing partiality to the powerful, it also forbids partiality to the weak. Leviticus 19:15 says, “You shall not show partiality to the poor nor give preference to the great, but you are to judge your neighbor fairly.” Pitiable circumstances may explain someone’s mindset that led to crime, but they should not legally excuse it. If a thief or rapist never had a good father to discipline him, we can feel bad for his circumstances, but he must still pay for his crimes. If a poor single mother would have trouble affording another child, I would love to help her or point her toward places that will, but that is not a license to murder.
The concept of biblical impartiality is mirrored in the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment, which declares that “no state shall . . . deny to any person the equal protection of the laws.” At the time of its ratification in 1868, legal dictionaries and the amendment’s own author, John Bingham, used “person” and “human being” interchangeably. Furthermore, thirty out of thirty-seven states at the time classified abortion as an “offense against the person.” While “person” can at times mean more than “human being,” it obviously can never exclude categories of humans. Preborn humans must receive the equal protection of the laws, including the laws against homicide. Treating abortion as homicide is the only way for a state to comply with the Constitution.
The Bible and US Constitution require nothing less than equal protection; affording to preborn children the same protections from homicide that the rest of us enjoy. In other words, it should be illegal for everyone to murder anyone. That includes mothers. We cannot claim to love our preborn neighbors as ourselves while advocating for them to receive lesser protection and handing out special murder rights for certain classes of people to kill them, namely, their own mothers.
On top of being biblically and constitutionally required, equal protection is the only way to stop self-managed abortion. The mainstream pro-life answer to this crisis, as we will discuss below, does not suffice.
Why Abortion Pill Regulation is Futile
While abolitionists seek to persuade Christians toward equal protection, pro-life establishment organizations have finally come up with their own answer to the mail-order abortion crisis. Recent legislative efforts in Oklahoma and Texas have focused on regulating the trafficking of abortion pills. While this means pro-life groups are finally pulling their heads out of the sand and acknowledging the grim reality of abortion pill distribution in pro-life states, method-centric legislation that merely restricts one particular method of abortion is doomed to fail.
There is nothing wrong with seeking to prohibit abortion pill distribution. For instance, I would love to see the federal government enforce the Comstock Act, which explicitly prohibits sending abortion pills via mail. But by going after pill distribution while leaving the act of abortion itself legally protected, these laws—even if passed and enforced—allow the abortion market to once again evolve and continue. Starvation, self-abuse, parsley, pennyroyal, and plenty of other easily accessible drugs, herbs, and substances can be used by women to induce abortions. More abortion technologies could be invented in the future. As long as the law gives women permission to murder their children with immunity—with legal protection—they will continue doing so. Playing whack-a-mole with methods is a futile game.
Further, as long as the law protects a mother’s right to murder her child, blue states with “shield laws” that protect abortion pill distributors, as well as foreign suppliers, will continue to supply abortion pills precisely because the pro-life law in the red state has removed consequences for the mother, the only in-state actor in that abortion.
Abortion pill trafficking bills target out-of-state abortion pill providers based on the legal theory that states can prohibit conduct committed from blue states and that blue state shield laws are unconstitutional. Maybe that theory is upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court; maybe it isn’t. Either way, the best-case scenario for these trafficking bills is for the Supreme Court to strike down shield laws. But again, this would only cause abortion pill distributors to move operations to another country—an inconvenience that would be barely a hiccup for them as they comfortably shipped pills to America from their bases in the Netherlands, Austria, and India prior to expanding their operations in the United States around the time of Dobbs. Spending years trying to make them move to Canada, Mexico, or Europe is, yet again, a futile game of whack-a-mole. It would be avoiding the only thing that matters: making the act of abortion itself illegal by establishing equal protection for preborn children.
Answering Objections
Objection #1: “Incrementalists and abolitionists share the same end but differ on the means.”
Simply put, they do not.
Almost every pro-life political organization supports blanket immunity for mothers to murder their children. Seventy-six of them, including National Right to Life, Susan B Anthony List, March for Life Action, Americans United for Life, the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, published an open letter on the morning of the House floor vote on the Abolition of Abortion in Louisiana Act in 2022:
Women are victims of abortion and require our compassion and support . . . As national and state pro-life organizations, representing tens of millions of pro-life men, women, and children across the country, let us be clear: We state unequivocally that we do not support any measure seeking to criminalize or punish women and we stand firmly opposed to include [sic] such penalties in legislation.
In state after state, when abolition bills are introduced, the local Right to Life is the frontline opposition. The “same goal” claim cannot survive contact with their legislative record and public statements. It’s a merry-go-round argument. Jump off, and the dizziness stops. The overwhelming majority of pro-life organizations do not want to make the act of abortion illegal. They only want to prevent third parties from helping women do it.
Maybe a particular pro-lifer does share the abolitionist goal. In that case, he ought not falsely pretend the Pro-Life Movement agrees with him. He ought to become an abolitionist.
Objection #2: “Moses regulated divorce, so incremental regulation is biblical.”
God’s wisdom in regulating divorce because of the hardness of their hearts in Matthew 19:8 served to manage the consequences of the inevitable existence of marital abandonment and broken homes. It also served to protect victims. In a fallen world, anarchy is a threat, first and foremost, to the weak. If marital abandonment were to happen in the ancient world without any legal mechanism, the woman (and her children) would be left without an identity, a home, or protection from false accusations.
We must also note that God gave the Israelites the ability to write certificates of divorce. He did not allow them certificates of child sacrifice. This, He treated very differently.
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ‘Say to the people of Israel, Anyone of the people of Israel or of the strangers who sojourn in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech shall surely be put to death. The people of the land shall stone him with stones. I myself will set my face against that man and will cut him off from among his people, because he has given one of his children to Molech, to make my sanctuary unclean and to profane my holy name. And if the people of the land do at all close their eyes to that man when he gives one of his children to Molech, and do not put him to death, then I will set my face against that man and against his clan and will cut them off from among their people, him and all who follow him in whoring after Molech’ (Lev. 20:1–5).
Divorce regulations in the Mosaic economy functioned within a covenantal civil order dealing with hardness of heart, managing a broken situation while restraining cascading harm to victims. But the civil magistrate is never given authority to decide that certain humans may be intentionally murdered with immunity for their murderer.
Equating “divorce certificates” with “abortion exemptions” is not biblical nuance. It is category confusion.
Objection #3: “Abolitionists lack a realistic path to implementation in the foreseeable future.”
Pro-life incrementalists often say this while failing to detail the actual political reality that makes such implementation so difficult. This comes as little surprise because they themselves are the political reality blocking equal protection legislation.
In 2022, Republicans held a supermajority in the Louisiana State House. The abolition bill passed seven to two in committee along party lines. But after seventy-six pro-life groups wrote the open letter opposing it, all Republicans but two flipped and opposed the bill on the floor. It would likely have passed without their obstruction. The same could be true in any Republican trifecta state. In these jurisdictions, the local National Right to Life affiliates are the primary opponents of equal protection for preborn children. In 2025, when I argued for the abolition bill in the Senate Judiciary Committee, it failed six to two, not because of Democrats, but because of pro-life Republicans and Oklahomans for Life.
Objection #4: “In blue states, we have to take what we can get. The culture is not ready.”
This argument sounds practical, compassionate, and reasonable. It is also how Christians talk when they have quietly assumed that God’s commands are negotiable until the world votes the right way.
The right response is not complicated: Obedience is ours; results belong to God.
The “culture is not ready” posture is crystal-ball theology. We are not authorized to predict outcomes and then decide whether obedience is “worth it.” If a culture is not ready for justice, the answer is not to baptize injustice. The answer is to preach repentance, to disciple nations, to speak prophetically, and to demand that magistrates stop bearing the sword in vain (Rom 13:1–4).
And this is where the pro-life movement must do some soul-searching: culture is downstream from the church. Culture often follows the church’s lead, and if the pro-life movement has been the most influential teacher, and abortion numbers continue to rise, perhaps taking ownership for failed strategies that immunize murderers and punish the innocent is the first step to change. Remember, judgment begins with God’s household.
If we believe Christ is King of kings, then when it comes to murder, we do not measure righteousness by what CNN, Fox News, or the voters will tolerate or what a legislature can pass this session. We measure it by the Word of God.
Yes, legislation in hostile states may require time. But the church must not proclaim a partial morality, and the magistrate must not codify partial justice. If the culture moves incrementally, let the people of God fear God, hold the line, and let culture move toward God’s holy standard of justice. We must never relax the commandments of God or teach others to do the same, or we “will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:19).
Let the culture move incrementally; we must obey God.
It must also be pointed out that a blue state unable to pass an abolition bill will likewise be unwilling to pass an incremental pro-life bill. The struggle, then, is mostly a cultural one, in which case we must ask: what demands from the church are most likely to result in cultural change? Only the demand for abolition roots our activism firmly in the unadulterated Truth and Word of God. This clear appeal to the conscience and call to repentance possesses the spiritual and moral weight to radically transform a culture’s conscience in a way that incremental demands do not. This prophetic approach achieves what milquetoast compromises and pragmatic worldly wisdom never can: it forces a society to confront the raw reality of the heinous sin being committed rather than negotiating its terms for continuance. Consistent biblical truth, spoken without apology in fear of the Lord, is the only weapon capable of breaking through the hardened hearts of secular progressives. Short of this occurring, neither abolition nor incremental regulations are achievable.
Objection #5: “If we pass abolition, it will galvanize the Left, and we will lose elections.”
This objection has become prominent in political circles and is one of the most powerful forces shaping conservative resistance to abolition. Many lawmakers and activists fear that establishing equal protection for the preborn will stir up pro-abortion voters, trigger ballot initiatives, and cost Republicans seats. In their minds, political caution will save more babies than uncompromising justice.
But Scripture never gives civil rulers permission to tolerate the shedding of innocent blood in order to preserve political power. God does not say, “Seek justice, correct oppression—unless it might cost your party an election.” He says, “Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression” (Isa. 1:16–17). The duty is clear, even when the consequences are uncertain.
The reasoning of this objection is nothing more than fear baptized as strategy. Proverbs 22:13 says, “The sluggard says, ‘There is a lion outside! I shall be killed in the streets!’”—meaning that excuses can always be made to avoid doing what is right, but they are often rooted in cowardice rather than reality. Proverbs 29:25 warns, “The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe.” When we refuse to do justice because we are afraid of what voters might do, we are placing our trust in human calculation instead of in the sovereignty of God, not walking by faith but by sight (2 Cor. 5:7). We are leaning on our own political understanding rather than trusting the Lord with all our heart (Prov. 3:5–6).
Moreover, civil magistrates are not called to win at all costs. They are called to be “God’s servant for your good…an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer” (Rom. 13:4). Their standard is not polling data but the law of God. To knowingly leave a class of innocent human beings without legal protection because justice might be unpopular is to “show partiality in judgment,” which God explicitly forbids (Lev. 19:15; Deut. 1:16–17).
We must also remember that we do not stand first before the ballot box but before the judgment seat of Christ. “So then each of us will give an account of himself to God” (Rom. 14:12). On that day, it will not comfort us to say, “We left abortion legal so we could keep a majority.” The question will be whether we defended the innocent and upheld justice when it was in our power to do so (Prov. 24:11–12).
Yes, the Left may rage. Yes, elections may be lost. But our calling is the same as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego: “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us…But if not…we will not serve your gods” (Dan. 3:17–18). Obedience is ours; results belong to God. Fear of political consequences is not a righteous excuse for continuing to permit the slaughter of our preborn neighbors.
Conclusion
For too long, we have allowed the allure of celebrating the never-ending stream of incremental pro-life victories to mask the fact that none of these “victories” are accomplishing much of anything. The data from Oklahoma and across the nation proves the incremental pro-life strategy of regulating methods and individuals while exempting the principal participants has not abolished abortion; it has merely modernized it. We have traded the surgical clinic for the mailbox, and in doing so, we have proven that a pro-life “ban” without equal protection is no ban at all—it is a license to self-managed abortion.
The blood of our preborn neighbors continues to cry out from the ground, not just from the blue bastions of secular insanity, but from the heart of the pro-life states in the Bible belt that we are told are safe havens. We cannot wash our hands of this blood while our own statutes explicitly authorize the immunity of those who end the lives of their own children. God is not mocked by our “pro-life” labels or our legislative “whack-a-mole” with pill distributors. He demands justice, and justice is not partial.
If we are to see an end to this holocaust, we must repent of the compromise and fear that has characterized the last fifty years. We must demand the total, immediate abolition of abortion through the establishment of equal protection for every human being from fertilization.
The post-Dobbs era has exposed the limits of the pro-life playbook. God is kind enough to show His people when their strategies are built on sand, and He has surely done so. The future of the movement to oppose abortion should be shaped by those who, then, had the foresight to understand the coming threat of self-managed abortion and who, now, have the backbone to do what must be done to put a stop to it. It is time to stop regulating the who, what, when, and where of the murder of our neighbors and start protecting them. We must obey God and uphold the Constitution by abolishing abortion rather than fixating on regulating methods. For preborn children, it is equal protection or bust.
