Posted on 01/20/2006 9:49:11 PM PST by wagglebee
WASHINGTON, United States, January 20, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) –The Supreme Court’s first abortion ruling in over five years has been claimed as a partial victory by life and family organizations.
Last week the Court ruled in favor of a New Hampshire law requiring parental notification before a minor girl obtains an abortion, but called for further hearings to ensure cases requiring emergency medical treatment are provided for under the law.
Planned Parenthood of Northern New England had challenged the law as unconstitutional, since it did not allow immediate abortion access in cases of non-life-threatening health concerns for the young mother. A lower court had decided in favor of Planned Parenthood and rejected the entire law.
Ed Whelan, Supreme Court specialist at National Review Online, said mainstream media coverage has ignored implications in the Supreme Court’s ruling for the protection of future legislation restricting access to abortion, in a media analysis from TimesWatch.
“The ruling should make it much tougher, if not ultimately impossible, for the abortion lobby to invalidate parental-notification statutes in their entirety because of supposed constitutional problems (or, more precisely, because of conflict with Supreme Court rulings) in a small fraction of their applications,” Mr. Whelan said.
“The same should be true for a range of other abortion regulations. “
The New York Times ran coverage of the ruling under the headline “Justices Reaffirm Abortion Access For Emergencies.” The court did indeed reaffirm emergency access to abortion, but it did not accept the lower court’s decision to throw out the entire parental-notification law.
The decision to protect parents’ rights to be notified of their child’s intended abortion procedure is seen as a significant victory for organizations defending life.
"Today's decision reaffirms that parents have a right to know and that girls have a right to have their parents involved--it is a victory for both parents and minor girls," Mary Spaulding Balch, State Legislative director for National Right to Life, said in a statement to the press. "There is no abortion procedure that can be performed so quickly that there is not enough time to make a short phone call to a minor girl's parents."
American Life League also sees a victory in the ruling.
"American Life League commends the Supreme Court for rejecting the appellate court ruling that overturned New Hampshire's parental notification law," said Jim Sedlak, vice president of American Life League. "However, we are disappointed with the high court's decision to return the case to the lower court for further consideration."
Pro-abortion groups have also acknowledged that an important precedent in favor of restricted abortion access has been set by the Court’s decision.
For coverage of the Supreme Court ruling, see:
US Supreme Court Avoids Major Abortion Ruling
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/jan/06011806.html
Pro-life ping.
Moral Absolutes Ping.
I am assisting little jeremiah with this list temporarily. If you have asked to be removed from this list and got pinged, I apologize. We are working on synchronizing the list.
Stop the insanity, w. Stop the insanity! :) HA!
It even then is a 4-5 court and needs to be at least a 5-4 court.
We need one of the who liberal sick or elerly Justices to bit the dust for change.
It's an important step. Some value of life was recognized by our Courts in this decision.
I truly think that if there are four SOLID pro-life votes, that Anthony Kennedy will step up to the plate.
According to an American Spectator article many years ago, Kennedy was ready to overturn Roe v. Wade in Planned Parenthood v. Casey with the other four but somehow backed out at the last minute, and went with O'Connor and Souter. The reason has never been divulged
IIRC, the speculation was that he backed out because Byron White was not comfortable with using Casey as the vehicle to overturn Roe v. Wade.
I believe that Kennedy WILL vote with Thomas, Scalia, Roberts and Alito if there is a case that can reasonably be structured to overturn Roe.
By the way, if anyone wants to "watch" the oral arguments, they can click here.
I'm not that confident Kennedy would go that far - however, he is more inclined to allow more restrictions on the procedure.
White dissented and joined the opinion stating Roe should be overturned. Amazingly, Roe only survived on a 5-4 vote in 1992.
It looks like we really need one more Bush appointment....won't that be a fun day in the Senate committee room! We have four solid conservative votes (with Alito) and possibly Kennedy will be the new OConnor swing seat....I dont think we can be sure he'll vote to overturn... me thinks it's time for Mr Justice Stevens to get a condo in Boca....he deserves it! Also, Ginsberg looks like she could use a tan...wouldnt two more Bushies on the SCOTUS make 2006 a beautiful year!
Maybe Karl Rove can set his evil hurricane making machine to brainwash the liberal justices into retiring immediately.....
I'm wondering on what grounds they'll overturn Roe....will they do the right thing and grant personhood and thus 14th amendment protection to the unborn and outlaw abortion altogether or will they kick it to the state legislatures to pass their own laws.
I oppose any abortion with every fiber of my being.
That being said, I also believe in the Constitution our Founding Fathers gave us, and I believe that just as with murder, abortion laws MUST be a matter for each individual state.
I agree with you that murder statutes are state issues, however in this case alone we're dealing with a 14th amendment issue if we define the unborn baby as a person. It would outlaw the practice in the whole nation. IMO it is a very limited, distinguishable set of circumstances that justifies federal action.
bflr (ping list unavailable at the moment...)
I'm sure there would be differnt "degrees" of abortion, just as there are different "degrees" of other murders. And some states would still try to facilitate the killing as much as possible. But if the SC acknowledges the personhood of the baby before birth, that would open the door for the Constitutional issue of "equal justice under law."
In other words, more decades of struggle. Still, it would be a tremendous thing. God grant it!
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