JAMES Madison University's Board of Visitors voted last Friday to ban the controversial "morning after" birth control pill from the JMU Student Health Center. The pill has been proven to be 60 to 90 percent effective in preventing pregnancies if taken less than 72 hours after intercourse. The Board's move was incited by a letter from Del. Robert Marshall, R-Manassas, who is anti-abortion, that claimed that this pill was a form of abortion. Because the pill is legal in the Commonwealth of Virginia and JMU is a state-sponsored university, and because the Board should not have jurisdiction over a woman's personal life, the pill should be allowed back into the JMU Student Health Center.
The governments of Virginia and the United States are still not quite sure how to classify the "morning after" pill. Because it stops the processes necessary to begin a pregnancy, some consider it a method of birth control. Others, however, see it as an abortive procedure because it affects the creation of an embryo when all the necessary components are already in the woman's body. For the time being, the Food and Drug Administration, as well as the federal government, consider the pill to be a contraceptive. Although many people are morally opposed to abortions and believe the pill to engage in such an action, the classification of this pill should have no bearing on whether it is offered in the JMU Student Health Center.
The pill is legal in both the United States and the Commonwealth of Virginia. A patient can take the pill if she wishes. This should remain the case at the JMU Student Health Center until the pill isdeclared illegal by a government with direct jurisdiction over the JMU Student Health Center.
Preventing a pregnancy is a highly personal decision for a woman to make, and it is hers alone. Because the pill is legal, a woman attending JMU is free to make this decision on her own accord. The JMU Board of Visitors has no jurisdiction over this particular aspect of a student's life. By not offering the pill, JMU's Board is denying the woman a choice to make a perfectly legal decision that would otherwise be available in many other parts of the Commonwealth.
In this same vein, the JMU Board of Visitors is not an entity of higher moral ground than any other individual. The Board can decide for itself that the "morning after" pill constitutes an abortion and is thus morally reprehensible. However, to force its moral decision on others is not only unfair and immoral within itself, it may possibly be against the law. Although there are no laws or court precedents regarding an unwanted pregnancy due to lack of a "morning after" pill from a public health facility, such a case could potentially arise due to the Board's decision. Because morals are subject to variation among individuals and other entities such as the JMU Board of Visitors, our federal and state government was set up in such a way that we elect officials who we believe represent our ideals and take office to define its constituents disparate morals into a code of ethics which our laws are based on. The JMU Board of Visitors is not such a governmental body and should have no jurisdiction over this particular issue in a woman's life, especially because it claims that it's making its decision in part on "moral" and not legal grounds.
The JMU Student Health Center is the only such institution where a student that attends that university or lives in Harrisonburg can gain access to this birth control. The Board's decision is of particular importance because they are capping off the only local site where many students can obtain the "morning after" pill. Because of this, a student at JMU may miss the 72-hour time window for taking the pill and become pregnant when she had the choice and desire to take the pill. The JMU Board of Visitors must not be allowed to affect a woman's personal life in this manner through its ban of the "morning after" pill.
Because JMU is a public university sponsored by the Commonwealth, it should reflect the laws of the commonwealth. The morning after pill is legal. JMU is not accurately representing the standards of the Commonwealth by taking away access to this pill.
Although the JMU Board should have the jurisdiction to control the drugs its Health Center offers, it has gone too far in eliminating the availability of the "morning after" pill. The JMU Board of Visitors should reconsider their actions, and their negative effects on the right of choice granted by the federal government to every female U.S. citizen through the Roe v. Wade decision. If the JMU Board does not reverse its decision, the Virginia General Assembly must step in and pressure the Board to permit the "morning after" pill back into the Student Health Center. This issue and its effects on JMU's female students is simply too significant to allow a non-governmental body to decide on its whims. The "morning after" pill must once again become an option for the female students of JMU.
(Alex Rosemblat's column usually appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at arosemblat@cavalierdaily.com.)
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