Supreme Court Upholds Texas Abortion Law

The Supreme Court of the United States today upheld the abortion laws passed by the State of Texas by a 5-4 vote.The majority refused to set aside a federal appeals court’s order permitting the law to take effect on October 31.

The law, opposed by Planned Parenthood and of course a number of Democrats was voted into law by a two thirds majority by the legislature in Texas after a number of Dr. Gosnell type abortion 'clinics' surfaced in the state. Th new law, in an effort to stop these chamber of horror sites from operating requires that any doctor in the state who is going to perform an abortion have professional privileges to admit patients to a hospital within thirty miles of the site where the abortion will take place.

A federal judge in Austin, District Judge Lee Yeakel, (a Bush appointee, so this was hardly partisan politics at work) had ruled last month that this requirement was unconstitutional, saying that it put a “substantial obstacle” in the path of women in Texas to terminate a pregnancy. The Fifth Circuit overturned that order, and cleared the way for the law to become effective while the Fifth Circuit is reviewing the constitutionality of the law.

Needless to say, Planned Parenthood is upset. They and and several other Texas abortion clinics said in their lawsuit to stop the measure that it would force more than a third of clinics in the state to stop providing abortions...and that meant that there was a lot of Federal money st stake for them.

I fail to see how merely requiring an abortionist to have admitting privileges in a hospital (which means he or she has gone through a certain amount of vetting) restricts anyone from having an abortion. And a clinic should have admitting privileges to a hospital within 30 miles in case something goes wrong.

Not only that, but as Justice Scalia argued successfully, this is a huge assault on federalism.

Odd how the Left absolutely salivates at the idea of restrictions and regulations on everything and anything except to right to kill babies on demand.

This isn't over yet, but it's a good precedent, and will effect laws in Tennessee and Utah, the other states enforcing their laws on admitting privileges as well as similar laws under temporary court injunctions in Alabama, Kansas, Mississippi, North Dakota and Wisconsin.

Of course, there's always Albuquerque, New Mexico, where a bid to ban abortions performed after 20 weeks unless a woman's life was at stake was defeated 45% to 55% after a well financed campaign by Planned Parenthood and others.

By 20 weeks ( 5 months) a baby has a fully developed nervous system and can feel the excruciating pain that results from having the skull punctured by surgical scissors and the brains vacuumed out to collapse the head as the baby is ripped from the womb. That's the usual method by which late term abortions are performed.