French lawmakers approved the bill by a vote of 780 to 72 in an unusual joint session of parliament.
French lawmakers approved a bill enshrining the right to abortion in the French constitution at a joint session of parliament at the Palace of Versailles.
The bill was approved Monday by an overwhelming vote of 780-72, with nearly the entire joint session erupting into long applause.
There was a mood of celebration across the country as women's rights activists hailed President Emmanuel Macron's promised move after a US court ruling scrapped the right to abortion.
The move makes France the first country in the world to provide explicit protections for abortion in its basic law.
Both the National Assembly and the Senate have already adopted a bill to amend Article 34 of the Constitution, which clearly states that women's right to abortion is guaranteed.
“France is on the front line,” said House Speaker Yael Braun-Pivet at the opening of the joint session.
“I'm proud of this Congress for saying the right to abortion will become part of our fundamental law,” she said.
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal previously said: “We send a message to all women: your body is yours and no one can decide for you.”
Following the U.S. Supreme Court's 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed women access to abortion, French activists called on France to explicitly protect the right in its basic law.
“Unfortunately, this incident is not isolated. Even in Europe, there are currents of opinion in many countries that seek to prevent at all costs a woman's freedom to have an abortion if she wishes,” France said. The preamble to the law states:
“I agree [to abortion] Withdrew from the US. There was therefore nothing that would allow us to consider France exempt from this risk,” said Laura Slimani of the rights group Fondation des Femmes.
“As feminist activists and as women, there are a lot of emotions. And I think it feels very solemn in a way because we're going to be living through a historical moment,” she added.
criticism
Reaction to the vote included criticism from anti-abortion groups and far-right leaders, including Marine Le Pen.
Le Pen said Macron was using the bill to score political points.
“I have no problem with including it in the constitution, so I will vote for it,” Le Pen said.
But calling it a historic step was an overstatement, she said, because “no one in France is putting abortion rights at risk.”
Pascal Molinière, president of the Catholic Family Association, said the vote was the result of “panic”.
“The United States was the first to remove it from the law with the repeal of Roe v. Wade, so we imported an argument that was not French,” she said. “There was a panic effect by the feminist movement to carve this into the marble of the Constitution.”
Women have had a legal right to have an abortion in France since 1974.
