Posted on 09/26/2005 3:26:12 PM PDT by RWR8189
The Bush administration has asked the Supreme Court to reinstate a ban on a procedure that critics call "partial birth" abortions, setting up a showdown that could be decided by the president's new choice for the court.
The appeal, which had been expected, follows a two-year, cross-country legal fight over the federal law.
An appeals court in St. Louis said this summer that the ban on late term abortion is unconstitutional because it makes no exception for the health of the woman.
The Supreme Court has already scheduled arguments in November in another abortion case, involving New Hampshire's parental notification statute. That case also asks whether the state law is unconstitutional because it lacks an exception allowing a minor to have an abortion to protect her health in the event of a medical emergency.
The court should review both cases, Solicitor General Paul Clement said in the appeal, which was filed Friday and released on Monday.
"This case involves the constitutionality of a significant act of Congress that has been invalidated and permanently enjoined by the lower courts," wrote Clement, the government's top Supreme Court lawyer.
The earliest that justices could take up the federal law, known as the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, is likely next spring. By then, the court could have two new members.
The Senate is expected to vote this week on President Bush's nomination of John Roberts to be chief justice. Bush will also soon name a replacement for retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who in the past has provided the fifth vote to strike down abortion laws without health exceptions.
In its last major abortion ruling, the Supreme Court on a 5-4 vote struck down Nebraska's so-called partial-birth abortion law in 2000. O'Connor, who voted with the majority, said that a a similar law could pass muster if it were limited to that particular procedure and included an exception to preserve the mother's life and health.
Clement noted that decision, Stenberg v. Carhart, in the government's appeal, but he said that Congress determined that late-term abortions are not needed to preserve a woman's health.
The case comes to the Supreme Court from Nebraska, where the federal law was challenged on behalf of physicians. Lawsuits were also filed in New York and San Francisco.
The case is Gonzales v. Carhart, 05-380.
If this isn't stopped NOW, the next step will be for some judge to grant a 6 month grace period on abortions AFTER birth. A woman can change her mind, can't she?
Excellent idea. Point out their crazy ideas for what they really are.
No question O'Connor's replacement could potentially alter the outcome. No question how O'Connor would rule if not replaced, and it would not be correctly.
The problem is that I don't know, no one does, how O'Connor's absence will affect Kennedy. It could still result in a 5-4 decision even without O'Connor if he takes it in his mind to drift further away from the Constitution.
Bogus reasoning. The job of any court, when two laws are in conflict, is to apply as much of both of them as possible that aren't in conflict with each other. So if the PBA ban conflicts with the Constitution because it doesn't provide an exception for the "health" of the mother (a dubious proposition to begin with, but I'll ride with it for a sec), then that in no way invalidates the law as applied to women whose health is not in danger.
Good people can, and will debate abortion til the cows fly. But anyone knowing the truth and the brutality of the late term abortion procedure can't possibly convince me that it should ever be an option.
My son was born 8 weeks early. He wasn't a clump of cells, he was a tiny human being.
Now he's 25 6'2" 250 #
That's the thing ... the "health" exception is, in practice, abortion on demand until the moment of delivery. That's why the Democrats insist on it.
Any woman who's well on in pregnancy has some "health" issues. I'm 22 weeks into my 10th pregnancy. My hands and feet swell up late in the day. I have painful muscle spasms if I don't take enough calcium pills. I have fainting spells from time to time. Any of those symptoms (more added each week until Baby Whatsis makes his appearance in the outside world) is an adequate "health of the mother" justification for abortion, assuming I wanted to look for a doctor who would do such an evil thing.
Additionally, in three or four weeks, my baby would have a good chance of surviving if my condition necessitated an early delivery. Almost all really serious conditions in pregnancy (some exceptions for emergencies) can be handled for a few weeks with medication, bedrest, etc., until the baby has a chance to survive premature birth.
All the best to the new addition to your family, by the way.
Thanks! We expect Baby around February 1 ... by which time I'll have the disposition of a wounded hippo, and the family would love to lock me in the garage until delivery, except somebody else would have to do the laundry. That's a "health of the mother" issue, too, as far as the Supreme Court is concerned :-(.
The current status of the law is absolutely insane. I pray we'll get some Justices soon - a few more retirements of nutcases would be good - who will overturn Roe vs. Wade and get the issue in state legislatures where it belongs, with no Federal oversight.
Then it assumes that we're too weak and selfish to handle the common discomforts of pregnancy. I have easy-to-medium-cruddy pregnancies, but I have friends with just as many children who have disastrous health problems during pregnancy, but still carry their babies to term, because they want their children.
Yes, sometimes there are reasons which absolutely necessitate an early delivery. Some babies are early because of natural premature delivery. And the survival of premature babies in the 25-30 week range is iffy. The point is that the intention in those situations is to keep both the mother and baby alive.
I don't get the motivation of the judges who rule "kill any baby, any reason, any time." The women are all too old for it to have any personal relevance. The men ... well, God is their judge. I just don't know what's wrong with these people.
I'll be delighted to have this pregnancy over with ... when I hold my living baby. I know, from two miscarriages of my own, and my friends' experiences, that we can't count on pregnancy's resulting in a living child.
Actually there is no debate between "good" people about abortion.
The ranks of the pro-choice/pro-abort side are filled with spiritual degenerates, deceived by Satan, and on their way to hell and the pro-life/anti-abortion side has the born again Saints of God.
The news media keep referring to it as "late term abortion," but the fact is most partial birth abortions are done in the second trimester, around 20 weeks.
BTTT
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