Half of Americans believe abortions are morally wrong, the highest percentage in seven years, a new Gallup poll found.
The Values and Beliefs poll, which Gallup conducts every year, found that 50 percent of Americans believe abortions are morally wrong, while 42 percent said they are morally acceptable.
Gallup also broke down the numbers into those who identify as liberal or conservative. Just 23 percent of conservatives said abortions are morally acceptable, while 73 percent of liberals did.
The opposition to abortion has not been this high in seven years, when 51 percent said they believe abortion is morally wrong, according to Christian Headlines.
The Values and Beliefs poll examines a number of other issues as well, including issues ranging from birth control (which has the highest moral support at 92 percent), to animal testing to polygamy. Issues related to the right to life included embryonic stem cell research, doctor-assisted suicide and human cloning.
According to the poll, 64 percent believe embryonic stem cell research, which involves destroying a human life in its earliest stage, is morally acceptable; 31 percent say it is morally wrong.
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On doctor-assisted suicide, which now is legal in seven states, 52 percent said they believe it is morally acceptable, while 44 percent said they believe it is morally wrong.
Many still oppose human cloning, however. The poll found that 85 percent believe it is morally wrong and 12 percent believe it is morally acceptable.
“All but five of these behaviors have been measured since the early 2000s, and Americans have increasingly taken a more liberal view on many of them since then,” Gallup noted.
The abortion issue is one of the exceptions. Americans appear to be just as divided as they were more than 40 years ago when the U.S. Supreme Court handed down Roe v. Wade.
Other polls have found similarly strong opposition to the killing of unborn babies in abortions. A May Hill-HarrisX survey found that 55 percent of voters said they do not think laws banning abortions after six weeks – when an unborn baby’s heartbeat is detectable – are too restrictive.
Earlier this week, another poll out of Harvard University found that just 6 percent of Americans said abortions should be allowed “up until the birth of the child,” while 8 percent said they should be permitted up to the third trimester. It also found that a majority of Americans want the U.S. Supreme Court to revisit Roe v. Wade.
Earlier this year, a Marist University poll found that just 13 percent of Americans support a New York law that legalized abortions for basically any reason up to birth.
