Data show pro-life movement must work harder in less religious states

Gallup recently asked residents of all fifty U.S. states to identify themselves as "very religious," moderately religious," or "nonreligious," and used this data to rank the states by religiosity. It found that Mississippi has the largest percentage of residents who are "very religious," at 59%. The least religious states are concentrated in New England: Vermont (21%), Maine (23%), and Massachusetts (25%).

The following table compares states' religiosity against two measures of its progress (or lack thereof) on the right to life: its legal ranking, via Americans United for Life, and its abortion rate, via the Guttmacher Institute. (We previously explored the correlation between pro-life laws and low abortion rates.)

State	% Very Religious	AUL Rank (#1 being most pro-life)	Abortion Rate (per 1,000 women of reproductive age; national rate is 14.6)
Mississippi	59	7	3.7
Alabama	56	23	8.3
Utah	54	25	4.6
South Dakota	53	6	3.5
South Carolina	52	20	6.4
Arkansas	52	4	8.0
Louisiana	50	3	10.8
Tennessee	50	15	10.7
Oklahoma	49	1	7.0
North Carolina	47	22	15.1
Georgia	47	8	15.7
Kentucky	47	19	4.1
Texas	45	17	9.8
Missouri	45	11	4.4
North Dakota	44	13	8.7
West Virginia	44	32	6.0
Nebraska	43	16	6.3
Kansas	43	2	12.9
Virginia	42	18	12.5
Idaho	42	21	4.2
New Mexico	41	39	11.7
Indiana	41	12	6.3
Iowa	40	35	7.5
Wyoming	39	37	1.1
Pennsylvania	38	10	13.3
Ohio	38	14	10.3
Wisconsin	38	24	5.6
Minnesota	38	28	9.3
Michigan	37	9	15.4
Illinois	37	30	16.3
Delaware	37	31	16.7
Florida	37	26	20.6
Arizona	36	5	9.8
Maryland	36	38	23.4
New Jersey	34	47	25.8
Montana	34	40	9.1
Colorado	32	29	12.1
California	31	49	19.5
New York	31	44	29.6
New Hampshire	29	33	10.4
Washington	29	50	13.7
Hawaii	28	41	14.0
Connecticut	28	43	19.2
Oregon	27	46	12.0
Alaska	27	34	10.0
Nevada	27	45	19.4
Rhode Island	27	27	17.0
Massachusetts	25	42	15.3
Maine	23	36	9.5
Vermont	21	48	12.1

Clearly, a correlation exists: more religious states tend to enjoy better pro-life laws and lower abortion rates.* The correlation is not perfect; to take one example, New Mexico and Indiana are very similar in terms of religiosity (41% "very religious" and 30% "nonreligious"), but New Mexico ranks far lower on AUL's list and its abortion rate is nearly double that of Indiana. 

Nevertheless, there is cause for concern. A faith-based pro-life movement is bound to be ineffective in the states where preborn babies most urgently need our help: New York (only 31% "very religious" and a sky-high 29.6 abortion rate); New Jersey (34%, 25.8); Maryland (36%, 23.4); Florida (37%, 20.6); California (31%, 19.5); Nevada (27%, 19.4); and Connecticut (28%, 19.2).

Let us leave no unborn child behind. If you support a secular approach that meets people where they are, please donate to Secular Pro-Life. 

*For the math nerds, I ran the data through an online coefficient calculator and found a correlation between % very religious and AUL Life List rank of -0.7185; between % very religious and abortion rate of -0.5051; and between AUL Life List rank and abortion rate of 0.4602.