To the editor:

In June the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that women do not have a constitutional right to make their own decisions about pregnancy. Since then, we have gained insight into the many issues involved. We now have a deepened appreciation for what is at stake for 10 year-old rape victims, for women experiencing miscarriages and being denied urgently needed care, for doctors who should be there providing scientifically based advice to pregnant women and who instead find themselves constrained by laws enacted by people without any medical training. We find ourselves, our daughters and granddaughters, assaulted by the crudest black and white thinking. A minority of people, certain that they represent the only correct Christian position on abortion, claim to be entitled to force their understanding, their ethical judgment, on everyone else.

Decisions about abortion are complicated; that these decisions are being taken out of the hands of individual women and their doctors and determined by laws and legislatures where one size must fit all is a tragic mistake. Over the summer Kansas, a red state, rejected the proposition that a state legislature is the right body to make decisions for every individual. We should follow the model of Kansas in keeping such heart-breaking, complex and medically-grounded decisions in the hands of individuals, not state legislatures or, worse yet, as a matter of national diktat.

Likely you know that our Congressional representative, Elise Stefanik, emphatically supports what she terms “right to life.” In July, even as she claimed to support the right for women to use contraception, she voted against the very bill that would have protected that right. This double-speak, “have it both ways,” stems from her insistence that women must use the products that she, Elise, supports — and only those. Her campaign is rife with similar misleading statements on many issues. Month by month Stefanik’s positions shift toward the MAGA Republicans as she seeks power and financing for herself, not for those whom she was elected to represent.

Fortunately, we have a sound alternative in Matt Castelli, the Congressional Democrat candidate whose consistency and integrity come as a welcome change. As one example, he is “focused on defending our personal freedoms, like a woman’s right to choose, as well as the 2nd Amendment.”

We in the North Country also have a terrific candidate for the state Senate in Jean Lapper (district 45, which now includes Canton, Potsdam and Massena as well as points south to Glens Falls). Lapper will fight “for a woman’s right to reproductive healthcare” that she chooses. Lapper and Castelli stand for moderate views that represent the common sense wisdom of most New Yorkers.

I urge you to keep women’s rights to the reproductive care that they decide they need in mind and vote for candidates who fully and consistently support that position.

The 2022 election has become a referendum on the rights of women to control decisions about their bodies. Almost exclusively, Democrat candidates support this right. Consider well and Vote Blue in ’22.

Patricia Alden

Canton