North Dakota

Re "N. Dakota's dubious honor," Editorial, March 19 As an obstetrician and gynecologist, I strongly urge North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple to put women and families first and veto the bill banning abortions after a fetus' heartbeat can be detected. I have cared for pregnant women with complex medical conditions. For some of these women, pregnancy termination is the only way to protect their health or save their lives. Roe vs. Wade made it possible to ensure that more women were able to access safe, legal and necessary abortions.

Floodwaters that swept through the Midwest last week failed to recede Tuesday after another inch of rain fell in Illinois and surrounding states, and forecasters warned that more was on the way. Heavy rainfall and severe thunderstorms battered the region with half a foot of rain last week, inundating several small towns - including Marseilles, Ill., and Kokomo, Ind. - and causing damage from lower Michigan to Missouri. Water coursed through downtown Chicago, submerging cars, knocking out power to thousands of residents and forcing the cancellation of hundreds of flights from O'Hare International Airport.

Earthmoving equipment and National Guard helicopters hauled sand Monday to reinforce leaky dikes that led to evacuations of two parts of town threatened by the Sheyenne River, the latest North Dakota stream to rise above its banks. Twice in 12 hours police had gone knocking on doors, urging people to get out. "It was just kind of disbelief, actually," said chiropractor Jeff Brown, who lives near one dike that had to be repaired Sunday night.

David Sutherland is the director of three remarkable documentary films - I should say at least three, having seen only the last three - notable for their length and their depth: "The Farmer's Wife," from 1998, a 61/2-hour look at a farm family in crisis; the six-hour "Country Boys," from 2005, about two teenagers in Appalachia; and now "Kind Hearted Woman," set in North Dakota, Minnesota and southern Canada, which follows a Native American woman and...

North Dakota lawmakers on Friday approved a state referendum for this fall on a constitutional amendment that, if passed, would effectively block abortion by holding that life begins at conception. In a 57-35 vote, the House followed the Senate's action and approved the referendum that now goes before the voters on the November ballot. Groups backing abortion rights said they will fight the referendum and, if needed, in the courts as well. “It is too intrusive and has too many unintended consequences,” Tammi Kromenaker of the Red River Women's Clinic, the state's sole facility offering abortions, said in a telephone interview with the Los Angeles Times.

North Dakota voters resoundingly defeated an attempt to abolish the state's property taxes Tuesday and were set to allow the University of North Dakota to rename its controversial mascot, which critics say denigrates Native Americans. More than 70% of voters rejected a grass-roots effort to eliminate state property taxes, according to unofficial returns, even though North Dakota has a budget surplus that exceeds $1 billion, in part due to an oil boom. More than 27,000 residents had signed a petition to get the measure on Tuesday's ballot.

Rick Santorum has won the North Dakota caucuses, according to a projection from the  Associated Press , the latest in a string of victories for the former Pennsylvania senator in America's heartland. The victory is Santorum's third of the night, coming after projected victories in Tennessee and Oklahoma. He's locked in a close race in Ohio with Mitt Romney. Before Super Tuesday, Santorum had won voting contests in Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado. According to the Republican National Committee, no delegates will be apportioned based on tonight's vote in North Dakota.

Boat crews from federal agencies including the Coast Guard patrolled farming country in southeast North Dakota on Saturday, looking for people stranded by record flooding from the Sheyenne River. The river had risen by as much as a foot in some areas since Friday. "Some people have already evacuated and some people are still fighting the fight," said Coast Guard Chief Exor Pabro. U.S.

North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple should not sign any of the legislature's half-dozen bills that seek to subvert a well-established constitutional right to abortion. Late last week, the North Dakota legislature passed a bill that would ban a woman from having an abortion as soon as the heartbeat of the fetus is detected, which can happen as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. If Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple signs it into law, North Dakota will have the ignominious distinction of being the most restrictive state in the country on abortion.

As the Red River crested Sunday, Fargo, N.D., residents watched with relief as their man-made clay and sandbag barriers held back the near-bursting waterway and signs of normality -- dog-walkers and packed after-church brunches -- reappeared in the state's most populous city. But not so in Harwood. That's not to say the city has been inundated. Most homes sit on high enough ground or were protected by strong enough levees to escape the water. But parts of Harwood, a pastoral blip of 701 residents (and more outside its boundaries)

North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple has signed into law the most restrictive abortion laws in the nation, including one that bans abortions after the detection of a fetal heartbeat, which can come as soon as six weeks after conception. A second bill signed by the Republican governor bans abortions solely for the purpose of gender selection and genetic abnormalities. And another requires that any physician who performs abortions must have staff privileges at a nearby hospital. The three new laws -- and a previously approved resolution calling for a November referendum on a constitutional amendment that is designed to protect life at any stage of development -- places the state at the forefront of efforts to limit abortion rights.

Re "N. Dakota's dubious honor," Editorial, March 19 As an obstetrician and gynecologist, I strongly urge North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple to put women and families first and veto the bill banning abortions after a fetus' heartbeat can be detected. I have cared for pregnant women with complex medical conditions. For some of these women, pregnancy termination is the only way to protect their health or save their lives. Roe vs. Wade made it possible to ensure that more women were able to access safe, legal and necessary abortions.

North Dakota lawmakers on Friday approved a state referendum for this fall on a constitutional amendment that, if passed, would effectively block abortion by holding that life begins at conception. In a 57-35 vote, the House followed the Senate's action and approved the referendum that now goes before the voters on the November ballot. Groups backing abortion rights said they will fight the referendum and, if needed, in the courts as well. “It is too intrusive and has too many unintended consequences,” Tammi Kromenaker of the Red River Women's Clinic, the state's sole facility offering abortions, said in a telephone interview with the Los Angeles Times.

North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple should not sign any of the legislature's half-dozen bills that seek to subvert a well-established constitutional right to abortion. Late last week, the North Dakota legislature passed a bill that would ban a woman from having an abortion as soon as the heartbeat of the fetus is detected, which can happen as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. If Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple signs it into law, North Dakota will have the ignominious distinction of being the most restrictive state in the country on abortion.

The North Dakota Senate on Friday passed a bill banning abortions when a fetal heartbeat is detected, which could be as early as six weeks of pregnancy. If signed by the governor, it would be the most restrictive abortion law in the nation. The vote comes about one week after Arkansas legislators overrode a governor's veto to become the first state to ban abortions involving fetuses 12 weeks or older. The North Dakota legislation is among a string of antiabortion bills that the state's lawmakers have been considering this session.

WASHINGTON -- Traffic deaths nationally were down last year to their lowest level since record-keeping began in 1949.  But not in North Dakota, where they were up 41%, the biggest increase of any state. Fourteen states, including California, recorded an increase in motor vehicle fatalities, even though the 32,367 traffic deaths last year were down 1.9% from the previous year, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The traffic safety agency this year projected a record low in 2011 traffic deaths as motorists drove less, perhaps because of high gas prices and a still-difficult economy.

Malcolm Parks scored a goal and assisted on another as North Dakota rebounded from an upset loss to beat United States International University, 6-3, in hockey Saturday night. Linemates Tony Hrkac and Bob Joyce added two assists each for North Dakota, which split its weekend series with USIU. The Gulls won, 5-3, Friday night. Grant Paranica, who joined Hrkac and Joyce on North Dakota's top line, opened scoring at 4:54 in the first period.

Scott Kraft's article (Nov. 5), "N. Dakota: Taking Chill Off Image," and the state's effort to promote tourism prompts this letter. I was born in Bismarck, N.D., in March of 1936. My grandfather MacDonnell was a state railroad commissioner, walked to work, blizzard or no, and ate an apple a day for lunch. Aside from my birth I expect his daily apple was the most exciting thing that ever happened to him in the state. At a tender age I moved to Baltimore, Md., and then, thanks to the moving gods, to Spearfish, S.D., which is "west of the river" and a place that puts Bismarck and Baltimore to shame--an easy task.

WASHINGTON -- Democrat Heidi Heitkamp emerged with a long-shot Senate victory in North Dakota, a Republican stronghold that the GOP considered one of its best opportunities to pick up a seat. But the results were close enough that the Republican can demand a recount. Heitkamp, the state's former attorney general, offered a spirited campaign against Republican Rep. Rick Berg with a compelling narrative as a centrist Democrat at odds with President Obama. She had a 3,000-vote margin with all precincts reporting, according to the secretary of state's office.

WASHINGTON - With the concession of the Republican in the North Dakota Senate race, Democrat Heidi Heitkamp becomes the uncontested winner,  and the 20 th woman to join the upper chamber in the new Congress, setting a  record. Republican Rep. Rick Berg conceded the race Wednesday in Fargo during a luncheon meeting of party members, declining to seek a recount for the race that was decided by fewer than 3,000 votes. “We see no reason to believe that the result of this election will change over the course of the official certification process,” Berg said in a statement.