WARSAW—On the night that protests began, a crowd of furious women spontaneously marched from outside the court that had virtually banned abortions in Poland, past the headquarters of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, and towards its chairman’s private Warsaw home. Jaroslaw Kaczynski was not in. As protests snowballed into Poland’s largest revolt in decades, the veteran politician’s once firm grip on power has also been noticeably absent.
On Oct. 22, Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal outlawed abortion in cases of fetal defects, the legal basis for 1,074 of the 1,110 terminations last year. The court was responding to a request submitted last December by 119 conservative lawmakers to review whether so-called eugenic abortions—in their words—contravened the constitutional guarantees of dignity and the right to life. Once in effect, the verdict will mean that abortions will only be permitted when pregnancies result from an illegal act, such as rape or incest, or when they endanger the mother’s health.
