(CN) — France on Monday became the first nation in the world to make abortion a constitutional right, a move spurred by the rollback of abortion rights in the United States.
French lawmakers overwhelmingly approved the amendment during a joint session of parliament at the Palace of Versailles. Both chambers had already approved the proposal and Monday’s vote was largely a formality, rich with symbolism.
When the amendment was approved at 6:48 p.m., the Eiffel Tower was lit up with the feminist slogan “My body, my choice” in French and English.
Adding abortion to the French Constitution was extolled as setting an example for other countries around the world in defense of women’s rights.
“French pride, universal message,” French President Emmanuel Macron said on social media after the vote.
Macron promised to make the right to an abortion “irreversible” after the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2022 overturned Roe vs. Wade, a 50-year-old ruling that protected abortion rights in the United States. The high court ruling cast into doubt a global trend toward liberalizing abortion rights and highlighted counter-trends championed by conservatives to restrict abortion around the world.
The French government cited the U.S. decision as a chief reason to enshrine abortion rights in the constitution.
“Unfortunately, this event is not isolated: in many countries, even in Europe, there are currents of opinion that seek to hinder at any cost the freedom of women to terminate their pregnancy if they wish,” the introduction to the French legislation said.
“It only takes a moment for everything we thought that we have achieved to fade away,” said Yaël Braun-Pivet, a member of Macron’s liberal Renaissance party and the first female president of the National Assembly.
Efforts to erode abortion rights have gained traction outside the U.S. too.
In the European Union, Poland outlawed abortion in most cases in 2022 following a ruling by its Constitutional Court. That same year, Hungary passed a law requiring pregnant women to listen to the pulse of the fetus from the very first ultrasound.
Meanwhile, conservatives in Italy and Spain have sought to grant embryos legal rights and require doctors to ask pregnant patients if they want to listen to the fetus’s heartbeat or view an ultrasound before deciding to have an abortion.
In a speech to the National Assembly before the vote, French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said protecting the right to an abortion was a safeguard against future attacks on women’s rights by “reactionaries.”
“We have a moral debt to women,” Attal said. He paid tribute to Simone Veil, a prominent legislator, former health minister and key feminist who in 1975 championed the bill that decriminalized abortion in France.
“We have a chance to change history,” Attal said. “Make Simone Veil proud.”
The amendment specifies in Article 34 of the constitution that “the law determines the conditions by which is exercised the freedom of women to have recourse to an abortion, which is guaranteed.”
The lower house of French parliament, the National Assembly, overwhelmingly approved the proposal in January. The Senate adopted the bill on Wednesday. The measure needed to be approved by a three-fifths majority in the joint session.
Ahead of difficult European elections in June, Macron hoped the abortion bill would put his right-wing rivals on the defensive and shore up his party’s sagging support from the left.
Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally and the conservative Republicans chose not to fight the amendment, though they questioned the need to make abortion a constitutional right because it is already legally protected.
“There is no need to make this a historic day,” Le Pen said ahead of the vote.
Polls have shown consistently that over 80% of French people support the right to abortion. A recent poll showed a solid majority was in favor of enshrining it in the constitution.
Sarah Durocher, a leader in the Family Planning movement, called Monday’s vote “a victory for feminists and a defeat for the anti-choice activists.”
With the right to an abortion added to the constitution, it will be much harder to prevent women from voluntarily terminating a pregnancy in France, women’s rights and equality activists said.
“We increased the level of protection to this fundamental right,” said Anne-Cécile Mailfert of the Women’s Foundation, as reported by the Associated Press. “It’s a guarantee for women today and in the future to have the right to abort in France.”
Since France enacted its constitution in 1958, it has been amended 17 times. The last time was in 2008, when parliament was awarded more powers and French citizens were granted the right to bring their grievances to the Constitutional Court.
Courthouse News reporter Cain Burdeau is based in the European Union.