Politics
Opinion: Is Arizona's abortion ban a return to the 19th century? No, it's actually worse
Arizona’s Supreme Court opened a new front in the war on women’s reproductive rights last week when it resurrected an obscure 1864 law that bans abortion in almost all cases. Critics of the ruling say the court has thrown Arizona back into the 19th century.
That isn’t entirely fair to the 19th century.
The irony of last week’s reactionary ruling is that the author of the original law, William T. Howell, was a progressive by the standards of his time. The politics of Arizona’s current justices bear little resemblance to the 19th century antecedent upon whom their ruling relies.
Although many of Howell’s views have aged poorly, he argued against the era’s prevailing patriarchal dogma and in favor of women’s property rights. Even his abortion law was guided by concerns about maternal health, not the right-wing, religious orthodoxy that animates much of the antiabortion movement today.
If 19th century legal precedent is important, so is historical context. As today’s lawyers and politicians battle over the future of abortion rights, they should understand how and why the original Arizona law came to be. The statute emerged from the upheaval of the Civil War and its little-known front in the West.
As a history professor and the author of a book on this subject, I never expected Howell to become a posthumous standard-bearer for the modern American right. If he’s known at all, it’s as an agent of Abraham Lincoln’s campaign to stamp out slavery in the Southwest and secure Union control of the region.
That story began in the spring of 1861, when a band of migrants from neighboring Texas seized power in southern New Mexico. Proclaiming their affinity for the slave-holding South, they broke from the Union and threw their allegiance behind the newly formed Confederacy. They named their new rebel territory “Arizona.”
Several months later, the Confederacy launched its first invasion of the war — into the Southwest. The rebel invaders routed U.S. troops in several battles, secured military control over Arizona and seized Santa Fe, New Mexico’s capital. Then they planned to march on the gold fields of California.
They never made it. In the spring of 1862, Union troops sabotaged the Confederates’ supplies and finally sent them scrambling back to Texas.
Congress then divided the region into a western half (Arizona) and an eastern half (New Mexico), splitting the erstwhile Confederate Arizona Territory. To strengthen the Union’s tenuous hold, Lincoln poured federal troops and agents into the region. One of them was Howell, newly appointed as an associate justice of Arizona’s territorial Supreme Court.
A veteran jurist and former Michigan legislator, Howell got to work on a new code of laws for Arizona. The final document, now known as the Howell Code, ran to nearly 500 pages. One of its primary purposes was to ensure that slavery would never again take root in Arizona.
Buried within it was the now-infamous abortion ban. The provision was no outlier. In fact, it was copied from California’s legal code, one of many such laws passed by states and territories in the 1860s and ’70s.
From the colonial era into the early 19th century, abortions had been commonly administered and rarely criminalized. Benjamin Franklin even included a recipe for an abortifacient in a math textbook, of all places. Abortions before “quickening” — within roughly the first four or five months of pregnancy — were considered “the purview of women” rather than the law, according to the historian Sarah Handley-Cousins. Even the Catholic Church “implicitly accepted” abortions before quickening, the historian Leslie J. Reagan has noted.
The Howell Code, then, marked a departure from a more permissive approach to abortion. Even so, the antiabortion laws of the mid-19th century were generally born of a sincere concern for women’s health that is absent from today’s legislation. Tellingly, Arizona’s original antiabortion clause appeared within a provision on poisoning. The underlying premise was that abortions posed health risks to women, who were seen as victims and not held legally liable for the medical procedures performed on them.
Howell himself had a woman’s health on his mind at the time. Shortly after drafting the code, he rushed back to Michigan to be at the bedside of his ill wife. She survived, and Howell remained in Michigan, never seeing his code put into practice.
The judge had previously defended women’s right to property in their own name rather than subsumed under her husband’s. He also advocated free public schools and opposed capital punishment (though executions were allowed for certain crimes under the Howell Code).
Howell is no progressive poster child by today’s standards. He was in many ways a man of his time. And his code, written hastily in his provisional courtroom — an adobe shack adjoining a horse corral — reflected some of the prevailing prejudices of the early American frontier, imposing numerous restrictions on people who weren’t white.
But Howell is nevertheless an awkward antecedent for today’s antiabortion movement. If Arizona’s 21st century Supreme Court justices wish to exhume an obscure 19th century predecessor from the recesses of history, that’s their prerogative. But they should understand that even he is misaligned with their extreme politics.
Kevin Waite is an associate professor of history at Durham University and the author of “West of Slavery: The Southern Dream of a Transcontinental Empire.”
Politics
EXCLUSIVE: ICE says El Paso detention facility will stay open under new contractor after $1.2B deal scrapped
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
EXCLUSIVE: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said Camp East Montana in El Paso, Texas will remain open and is undergoing an operational upgrade, Fox News Digital has learned.
“Camp East Montana is NOT closing, quite the opposite,” an ICE spokesperson exclusively told Fox News Digital Tuesday.
“Rather, ICE has contracted with a new provider following Secretary Noem’s termination of the old contract inherited from the Department of War. ICE is always looking at ways to improve our detention facilities to ensure we are providing the best care to illegal aliens in our custody.”
Camp East Montana is photographed Friday, March 6, 2026, in El Paso, Texas. (Omar Ornelas/El Paso Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)
BLUE-STATE GOVERNORS MOVE TO KEEP HEAT ON NOEM AS DHS FIRES BACK
The spokesperson said the new contract will allow the facility to maintain what the agency described as the “highest detention standards” while expanding oversight.
According to ICE, the new contractor will also provide increased on-site medical care, additional staffing and a “PRECISE quality assurance surveillance plan.”
The agency said the updated agreement also strengthens ICE’s direct oversight of operations at the El Paso-area facility.
“Far from closing, Camp East Montana is upgrading,” the spokesperson said.
El Paso immigration facility faces scrutiny but ICE says Camp East Montana is upgrading, not closing, after the $1.2 billion contract termination. (Omar Ornelas/El Paso Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)
FOUR ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS LINKED TO MS-13 INDICTED FOR ALLEGEDLY MURDERING 14-YEAR-OLD BOY IN MARYLAND PARK
The news that the facility will remain open comes after The Washington Post reported that the facility could face closure amid scrutiny over operations.
A document was distributed to ICE staff, the Post reports, indicated that the agency was drafting a letter to terminate the facility’s $1.2 billion contract at an unspecified date.
ICE officials, however, characterized the contract termination as a deliberate effort by Noem to raise standards and improve services.
Download
Image
Headline:
Syndication: El Paso Times Caption:
Camp East Montana is photographed Friday, March 6, 2026, in El Paso, Texas, as a bus enters the detention center. (Omar Ornelas/El Paso Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
The facility, located at Fort Bliss in Texas, has been used to house thousands of detainees as part of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement efforts.
ICE did not immediately provide details on the identity of the new contractor or the timeline for full implementation.
WASHINGTON — Russia is emerging as one of the few early economic beneficiaries of the war with Iran, as disruptions to energy infrastructure drive up demand for Russian exports and the world casts its gaze to the Middle East and away from Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
The U.S. and its European counterparts slapped severe sanctions on Russia in March 2022, barely a month into Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The effect was a stranglehold on Russia’s exports, depriving Putin’s war effort of at least $500 billion, experts say. But over the last week, as President Trump’s war in the Middle East choked energy markets worldwide, the White House began easing its restrictions on Moscow.
“It is traitorous conduct for you to help Russia,” California Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) said on X, demanding the Trump administration reverse course. “Russia is giving intelligence info to Iran that helps Iran target American forces.”
Crude droplets rained over Tehran after Israeli airstrikes decimated oil depots, draping the Iranian capital in a dense smog. Iranian counterattacks have also targeted refineries and oil fields in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. Crude oil prices have surged, and traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has all but ceased, sending energy importers in search of alternate sources.
Those spikes are giving Russia, one of the world’s largest oil and gas exporters, a rare advantage. After spending a decade as the world’s most sanctioned nation over his aggression in Ukraine, Putin is finally starting to regain some leverage in global markets.
“In the current economic situation, if we refocus now on those markets that need increased supplies, we can gain a foothold there,” Putin said at a meeting at the Kremlin on Monday, according to Russian state media. “It’s important for Russian energy companies to take advantage of the current situation.”
On March 4, the Treasury Department issued a temporary 30-day waiver allowing Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil. The appeal by the Trump administration was described as a way to ease demand for Mideast oil, but was criticized as a reversal of sanctions placed against Putin meant to deny him the capital needed to fund his occupation of eastern Ukraine.
Now, Moscow is poised to press that advantage further, after Trump said Monday he will further lift sanctions on oil-producing countries to ease the trade friction and reintroduce additional oil and gas supplies. The only countries with U.S. oil sanctions are Russia, Iran and Venezuela.
“So, we have sanctions on some countries. We’re going to take those sanctions off until this straightens out,” Trump said at a news conference at his golf club in Doral, Fla. “Then, who knows, maybe we won’t have to put them on — they’ll be so much peace.”
The surprise concession to Moscow comes as reports suggest Russia is assisting Iran in targeting U.S. personnel.
Trump’s announcement followed an unscheduled hourlong call with Putin about the situation in the Middle East.
The war has also set the stage for Russia to make gains in Ukraine, as hostilities draw the global spotlight away from Kyiv and its struggle to hold back the bigger Russian army. U.S.-brokered talks between the two adversaries have been sidelined as Washington shifts focus to its war in Iran.
“At the moment, the partners’ priority and all attention are focused on the situation around Iran,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on X. “We see that the Russians are now trying to manipulate the situation in the Middle East and the Gulf region to the benefit of their aggression.”
Putin is unlikely to intervene militarily on Iran’s behalf, according to Robert English, an international foreign policy expert at USC. Instead, Putin is expected to play his position carefully, reap the economic rewards, and keep focused firmly on Ukraine at a time when key air defense systems are diverted from Ukraine to the Persian Gulf.
“Russia is winning the Iran-U.S.-Israel war, at least so far. Oil and natural gas prices have soared, filling Putin’s Ukraine war chest,” he said. “Russia is gathering forces for a big spring offensive in Eastern Ukraine, and it’s not even front-page news.”
Ukraine has dispatched drone interceptors and ordered its anti-drone experts to pivot from their war with Russia to help Western allies help intercept Iranian attacks. Zelensky’s allegiance may not pay off, English said.
“When will Ukraine see the benefits of helping the U.S. with anti-drone technology? No time soon, apparently,” he said.
Even several weeks of interruption in Gulf energy supplies could bring the largest windfall to Russia, the Associated Press reported, citing energy analysts.
The economic turmoil caused by the war has exposed vulnerabilities in Europe’s energy system, particularly its lingering dependence on Russian fuel.
Despite sanctions, the European Union remains a major purchaser of Russian natural gas and crude oil. Russian gas accounted for approximately 19% of E.U. gas imports in 2025. Allied Europeans have agreed to completely stop importing Russian liquefied natural gas, oil and pipeline gas by late 2027.
Putin expressed no desire Monday to rescue the European market now that U.S.-Israeli escalations and Iranian retaliation have choked oil production and shipping. The Russian president instead proposed to divert volumes away from the European market “to more promising areas” like the Asia-Pacific region, Slovakia and Hungary, which he said were “reliable counterparties.”
European leaders have been criticized for being “stunned, sidelined, and disunited” since hostilities began in late February. Excluded from the initial military planning by the U.S. and Israel, Europe entered the conflict with gas storage at only 30% capacity, the lowest levels in years. Instead of bold action, English said, European leaders have quarreled over internal divisions and rivalries.
“Sky-high energy prices are the underlying cause of many of these frictions, as Europe struggles now more than ever to find affordable alternatives to the cheap Russian petroleum,” English said.
Antonio Costa, president of the European Council, told European leaders in Brussels on Tuesday that rising energy prices and the world’s shifting attention risk strengthening the Kremlin at a critical moment in the war in Ukraine.
“So far, there is only one winner in this war,” Costa said. “Russia.”
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
President Donald Trump is taking his feud with Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., to the libertarian lawmaker’s home turf on Wednesday.
Trump is expected to hold an event in Hebron, Kentucky, on Wednesday, the Republican Party of Kentucky announced on social media Monday. It’s located in the northern part of the state’s 4th Congressional District, which Massie represents.
Massie’s primary rival, Ed Gallrein, will attend the Hebron event, his campaign confirmed to Fox News Digital on Tuesday, while deferring all other questions on the matter to the White House.
Massie himself will miss the event due to a previously scheduled official engagement, his spokesperson told Fox News Digital.
KHANNA AND MASSIE THREATEN TO FORCE A VOTE ON IRAN AS PROSPECT OF US ATTACK LOOMS
President Donald Trump will be visiting Rep. Thomas Massie’s congressional district on Wednesday. (Win McNamee/Getty Images; Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images)
When asked about the visit, White House spokeswoman Liz Huston told Fox News Digital, “President Trump will visit the great states of Ohio and Kentucky on Wednesday to tout his economic victories and detail his Administration’s aggressive, ongoing efforts to lower prices and make America more affordable.”
The president has thrown his considerable influence behind Gallrein to unseat Massie after the GOP lawmaker publicly defied Trump on multiple occasions.
MASSIE, KHANNA TO VISIT DOJ TO REVIEW UNREDACTED EPSTEIN FILES
Massie most recently was one of two House Republicans to vote to stop Trump’s joint operation in Iran with Israel, though the legislation was successfully blocked by the majority of GOP lawmakers and a handful of Democrats.
Ed Gallrein, left, seen with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office at the White House. (Ed Gallrein congressional campaign)
He was also one of two Republicans to vote against Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” last year.
Trump in turn has hurled a slew of personal attacks against Massie, including calling him “weak and pathetic” in a statement endorsing Gallrein in October.
“He only votes against the Republican Party, making life very easy for the Radical Left. Unlike ‘lightweight’ Massie, a totally ineffective LOSER who has failed us so badly, CAPTAIN ED GALLREIN IS A WINNER WHO WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN,” Trump posted on Truth Social at the time, one of numerous criticisms targeting the Kentucky Republican through the years.
He called Massie the “worst Republican congressman” in July amid Massie’s bipartisan push to force the Department of Justice (DOJ) to release its files on Jeffrey Epstein.
Then-Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, and Rep. Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, during a news conference outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2025. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
But Massie has so far appeared to defy political gravity despite making political enemies out of both Trump and House GOP leaders.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
He handily defeated multiple primary challengers in 2024 and 2022, despite public feuds with Trump, and has served his district since 2012.
Gallrein is a retired Navy SEAL and farmer who launched his campaign days after Trump made his endorsement. Their primary election day is May 19.
4Warn Weather Alert issued for Wednesday morning in Metro Detroit — What this means
Court document details attack on SF mayor’s bodyguard as Lurie responds to incident
Cowboys Team Doctor Played Role in Maxx Crosby-Ravens Trade Debacle
2-year-old boy bitten in face by two pit bulls in Miami Gardens backyard, police say
Shay Maloney’s overtime goal lifts Boston Fleet to road victory
Florida High School Football Rankings: Top 25 teams – Oct. 21
Cleary's 21 help Le Moyne down Central Connecticut State 69-64 in OT
How old is Bo Nix? What to know about Oregon quarterback ahead of 2024 NFL Draft
99th annual Pony Swim held in Virginia
Indiana Members Credit Union announced as new anchor tenant at Bottleworks District
EXCLUSIVE: ICE says El Paso detention facility will stay open under new contractor after $1.2B deal scrapped
Von der Leyen ‘acting outside of competence,’ Araud tells Euronews
Wheelchair curler Steve Emt’s path from drunk driver to three-time Paralympian
Map: 2.3-Magnitude Earthquake Reported North of New York City
Trump stirs GOP primary drama with visit to Massie’s Kentucky home turf
-
Wisconsin1 week agoSetting sail on iceboats across a frozen lake in Wisconsin
-
Massachusetts1 week agoMassachusetts man awaits word from family in Iran after attacks
-
Pennsylvania6 days agoPa. man found guilty of raping teen girl who he took to Mexico
-
Detroit, MI5 days agoU.S. Postal Service could run out of money within a year
-
Miami, FL7 days agoCity of Miami celebrates reopening of Flagler Street as part of beautification project
-
Sports7 days agoKeith Olbermann under fire for calling Lou Holtz a ‘scumbag’ after legendary coach’s death
-
Virginia7 days agoGiants will hold 2026 training camp in West Virginia
-
Culture1 week agoTry This Quiz on the Real Locations in These Magical and Mysterious Novels