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Abstract
Forty years after the Supreme Court legalized abortion in its landmark Roe v. Wade decision, the issue continues to generate heated debate and high emotion. With Democrats who support abortion rights controlling the White House and Senate, much of the anti-abortion battle has moved to the states, where legislators have passed increasingly restrictive measures in an effort to limit use of the procedure and test the boundaries of Roe v. Wade. As abortion rights groups struggled to keep the procedure legal, controversies erupted over anti-abortion comments made by three Republican congressional candidates' efforts to defund Planned Parenthood and end government-mandated health insurance coverage for birth control. Recently, the debate has shifted to whether emergency contraception should be made available to young girls without a prescription.