States Step Up Fight on Abortion
INDIANAPOLIS — Taking direct aim at Roe vs. Wade, lawmakers from several states are proposing broad restrictions on abortion, with the goal of forcing the U.S. Supreme Court -- once it has a second new justice -- to revisit the landmark ruling issued 33 years ago today.
The bill under consideration in Indiana would ban all abortions, except when continuing the pregnancy would threaten the woman's life or put her physical health in danger of "substantial permanent impairment." Similar legislation is pending in Ohio, Georgia and Tennessee.
The bills are in direct conflict with the Supreme Court's 1973 rulings establishing abortion as a constitutional right. Roe vs. Wade and its companion case, Doe vs. Bolton, asserted that doctors could consider "all factors
In the years since, states have adopted a variety of laws designed to restrict access to abortion or force women to think through alternatives. Those efforts are expected to continue this year, with states considering proposals to impose new licensing standards on abortion clinics, or to require women seeking abortions to first view ultrasound images of their fetuses and discuss with a counselor the pain a fetus might feel during the procedure.
About 50 such bills were passed in 2005 -- twice as many as in 2004, according to the abortion rights group NARAL Pro-Choice America.
In California, a fetal pain bill was introduced last year but never made it out of committee. Voters narrowly rejected a November ballot initiative that would have amended the state's constitution by requiring parental notification before a minor could obtain an abortion.
Increasingly, lawmakers opposed to abortion are seeking bolder measures.
Republican Rep. Troy Woodruff, serving his first term in the Indiana Legislature, wrote House Bill 1096 knowing it would conflict with Roe vs. Wade.
That was precisely his point: He wants his ban appealed to the Supreme Court, in hopes that the justices will overturn Roe and give states the power to make abortion a crime. "On an issue that's this personal, it should be decided as local as possible," he said. "We either want these procedures, or we don't
The debate unfolds as the Senate prepares to vote on Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr., a federal appellate judge. As a Reagan administration lawyer, Alito laid out a plan to overturn Roe vs. Wade. In his confirmation hearings this month, he declined to call the case "settled law," suggesting that he might be willing to reverse or modify it.
