CNA Staff, Aug 25, 2025 / 09:00 am (CNA).
When it comes to unborn life, only 19 states in the U.S. protect unborn children from abortion during the first trimester of their lives. As far as assisted suicide goes, in 10 states as well as the District of Columbia, it is legal. And in about half of U.S. states, the death penalty is legal.
CNA is unveiling three new interactive maps to show where each state in the U.S. stands on life issues. The maps will be updated as new information on each issue becomes available.
Here’s an analysis of the maps and of the laws around life issues across the United States as of August 2025.
Abortion
After the overturn of Roe v. Wade, abortion legislation returned to the states. But in 2024, Americans had more than 1 million abortions, according to the latest data.
See CNA article for interactive map.
Twelve states now protect life throughout pregnancy with some exceptions. Soon after Roe was overturned in 2022, Texas prohibited almost all abortions, leading the charge alongside a few other states whose pro-life trigger laws went into effect.
Seven states protect unborn children within the first trimester, usually at the times when the child’s heartbeat can be detected, which is about five to six weeks. Ohio led the charge for heartbeat legislation — laws that protect unborn children once a heartbeat can be detected. Florida also passed a heartbeat law in 2023 under Gov. Ron DeSantis. Nebraska passed a pro-life constitutional amendment protecting life after 12 weeks.
In 18 states, laws protect life after 18-24 weeks. Most of these states protect life only after “fetal viability,” the time when a baby can survive outside the womb with medical support. Viability is usually estimated to be between 22 and 23 weeks by most doctors, but it continues to advance thanks to improving technology. For instance, a baby born last year celebrated his first birthday after being born at 21 weeks.
Abortion is legal up to birth in nine states and Washington, D.C. Alaska, Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, and Vermont have no protections for unborn children at any stage of development. In most of these states, taxpayer dollars fund abortion.
Several states have passed ballot measures in recent years declaring a “right to abortion” or “reproductive freedom” under the state constitution. These states include Arizona, California, Colorado, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, and New York. In states with a right to abortion, the constitutional amendments leave room to expand already existing laws. While California currently allows abortion up to viability and up to birth in cases of the mother’s life or health, pro-life advocates warn that the constitutional right to abortion could lead to an expansion of abortion in the state.
Four states have ongoing litigation over abortion laws, including in Missouri, where courts are determining how the state’s constitutional right to abortion will be enforced. In 2024, Montana also approved a constitutional right to abortion in 2024 that is currently being challenged in court. Abortion laws in North Dakota and Wyoming are also in flux.
Assisted suicide
Assisted suicide — sometimes also called physician-assisted suicide — is when a doctor or medical professional provides a patient with drugs to end his or her own life. It is to be differentiated from euthanasia, which is the direct killing of a patient by a medical professional.
The term euthanasia includes voluntary euthanasia, a practice legal in some parts of the world when the patient requests to die; involuntary euthanasia is when a person is murdered against his or her wishes, and “nonvoluntary” euthanasia is when the person is not capable of giving consent.
Assisted suicide is legal in some U.S. states and around the world, while voluntary euthanasia is legal in a limited number of countries including Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Ecuador, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain, and Portugal. In Belgium and the Netherlands, minors can be euthanized if they request it.
In Canada, patients with any serious illness, disease, or disability may be eligible for what is known as medical aid in dying (MAID), even when their condition is not terminal or fatal. In 2027 Canada plans to allow MAID for those with mental health conditions; Belgium, Luxembourg, and Colombia already allow for this.
While most U.S. states have laws against assisted suicide, a growing number of state legislatures have attempted to legalize it.
See CNA article for interactive map.
Thirty-eight states in the U.S. have laws against assisted suicide. Some states specify that assisted suicide is illegal, while other state codes say they do not “authorize” assisted suicide.
Other states maintain laws that were enacted before assisted suicide was popularized in the late 1990s. Often, these states ban the practice of “assisting suicide.”
Some states have established newer legislation against the practice in recent decades including Maryland, Michigan, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, and Virginia.
The state of West Virginia has taken the lead in opposing assisted suicide. In 2024, the state became the first to approve a constitutional amendment banning assisted suicide.
In 10 states and in Washington, D.C., assisted suicide is legal. Oregon was the first state to legalize assisted suicide in 1997.
In another two states — Montana and New York — legislation that could legalize the practice is still pending. New York’s legislation awaits the signature of the state governor, while pro-life voices such as Catholic Cardinal Timothy Dolan are outspoken against the bill.
Death penalty
The United States is split on the death penalty, which is also known as capital punishment. Twenty-three states have the death penalty, while 23 states have abolished it. In the remaining four states, executions have been temporarily paused via executive action, but the death penalty has not been abolished.
See CNA article for interactive map.
Of the states that have abolished the death penalty, Michigan took the lead, becoming the first state to abolish the death penalty in 1847. Alaska and Hawaii — both newer states — have never had the death penalty.
Five states (Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah) allow the death penalty via firing squad as an alternative to lethal injection.
The federal death penalty can be used for certain federal crimes in all 50 states as well as U.S. territories.
A total of 16 federal executions have occurred since the modern federal death penalty was instituted in 1988. The federal death penalty was found unconstitutional in the Supreme Court’s decision Furman v. Georgia in 1972 but was later reinstated for certain offenses and then expanded by the Federal Death Penalty Act of 1994. In 2024, President Joe Biden commuted the sentences of 37 men, leaving three men on death row.
Where does the Catholic Church stand on life issues?
On abortion: The Catholic Church opposes direct abortions in all cases, teaching that human life must be protected at all stages. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception” (CCC, 2270).
“Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion,” the catechism says. “This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable” (CCC, 2271).
Notably, the Church does not teach that the life of the child must be preferred to the life of the mother but rather instructs doctors “to make every effort to save the lives of both, of the mother and the child.”
On assisted suicide: The Catholic Church condemns both assisted suicide and euthanasia, instead encouraging palliative care.
The Church advocates for a “special respect” for anyone with a disability or serious condition (CCC, 2276). Any action or lack of action that intentionally “causes death in order to eliminate suffering constitutes a murder gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, his Creator,” the catechism reads (CCC, 2277).
On the death penalty: In 2018, the Vatican developed the Church’s teaching on the death penalty, with Pope Francis updating the Catechism of the Catholic Church to reflect that the death penalty is “inadmissible” in the contemporary landscape.
St. John Paul II’s previous teaching in the catechism permitted the death penalty in “very rare” cases, saying that “cases of absolute necessity for suppression of the offender ‘today … are very rare, if not practically nonexistent” (CCC, 2267, pre-2018).
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About the death penalty, is the term “inadmissible” absolute in its meaning?
Or, respectfully, did Pope Francis simply tighten further the prudential judgment in application offered earlier by Pope John Paul II, while not actually “developing” the former doctrine, itself, out of existence? In early response to The Gospel of Life, Cardinals Ratzinger and Avery Dulles offered comments:
RATZINGER: “Clearly the Holy Father has not altered the doctrinal principles…but has simply deepened (their) application…in the context of present-day historical circumstances” (National Review, July 10, 1995, p. 14; First Things, Oct. 1995, 83). In a July 2004 letter to former-Cardinal McCarrick—a letter intended for all of the bishops but which came to light only when later leaked to the press—he wrote: “Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia….There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.”
AVERY DULLES: …traditional teachings on “retributive justice” and “vindication of the moral order” are not reversed by John Paul II’s strong “prudential judgment” regarding the use of capital punishment. The pope simply remained silent on these teachings. (“Seven Reasons America Shouldn’t Execute”, National Catholic Register, 3-24-02).
For his part, ST. JOHN PAUL II placed his prudential judgment (The Gospel of Life, n. 56) as a segue to his greater point (likely intended for a European Union audience where the death penalty is already prohibited as a condition for EU membership): “If such great care must be taken to respect every life, even that of criminals and unjust aggressors, the commandment ‘You shall not kill’ has absolute value when [!] it refers to the INNOCENT PERSON [italics]. And all the more so in the case of weak and defenseless human beings, who find their ultimate defense against the arrogance and caprice of others in the absolute binding force of God’s commandment” (n. 57).
ANALOGY: In courtroom proceedings, some evidence is “inadmissible,” but still exists.
How many times did God command abortion in the Bible? How many times did He command euthanasia? How many times did He command the death penalty?
One of these topics is not like the others.
Note that changing any catechism — yes, including that Catechism — is easy — much easier than actually changing the Teachings of the Church. Note also that Marcionism is still a heresy: the God of the Old Testament is still the God of the New Testament, and He has never established unjust punishments, nor has He recently learned about the extent (and limitations) of human dignity.
As for that passage in the Catechism, it is mind-boggling that any one would attempt to argue from the Christian perspective against the death penalty while never using the words “mercy” or “forgiveness”.
Almost as mind-boggling as attempting to “correct” the wording of the Our Father, or as placing a Pachamama statue in a position of liturgical honor.
For a clearer understanding of where some of our bishops stand, it’s worth noting that at a recent meeting of, The Association of U.S. Catholic priests, various speakers contended that chastity can be so frustrating that it can have a causal relationship to a man picking up a gun and becoming a mass murderer. Yes, you read that right.
No mention was made of the connection between sexual license and the actual mass murder of abortion.
I suppose there are documented cases of that happening. However, work also can be so frustrating that it can have a causal relationship to a man picking up a gun and becoming a mass murderer. I dare say that happens much more often; remember the phrase “going postal”? So, would the bishops have us give up on work?
Edward: abortion, perhaps a different issue?
No, not really. Chastity and sexual license are the same issue from different directions, and, as Edward points out, one of them really does lead to deaths — millions of them each year in the USA alone.
It’s like someone pointing out the fact that sober people can be dangerous behind the wheel. That is certainly true, but if the suggestion is left hanging that it might be safer to down a few beers before driving, that is using cherry-picked truths to promote a false narrative.
Not sure what you mean Brother. I believe it is rather self-evident that the exponential increase in abortions is the demonic rotten fruit of the chastity hating sex revolution, to which many Catholics have made concessions.
It has even become mandatory in many “sex education” curriculums to ridicule the idea of chastity as “damaging” to the “self-affirmation” of young people.
Where does the Catholic Church stand on organ harvesting resulting in the biological death of the comatose person? There is only silence, or the misuse of a few papal statements.
Are there none in the Church who will address what is, plainly stated, a violation of the Fifth Commandment, and a simple butchery.
Dear Roger. When a patient has irreversible brain damage with loss of life protective reflexes and requires machine generated and dependent breathing and artificial feeding via an intravenous drip or an intragastric tube and has failed a number of trials to assess the capacity to recover by temporarily shutting off the ventilators and other forms of artificial life support, the Catholic Church does not impose or suggest any moral obligation to maintain the artificial means of life support regardless of what the American courts may have ruled in cases such as the famous Quinlan affair. The courts have gotten so much wrong in matters pertaining to human life that the Church is a far better opinion to follow when it boils down to matters of morality.
Mr. John Frawley: Your clinical case, just as you describe, concerns the prudential issue of life support. My above case, of Aug, 25, is also of a living patient, but one who will be killed for his organs and tissues, and under the fiction of “brain death”. About this the Church is culpably silent.