US District Judge Susan Webber Wright struck down an Arkansas law last week that would have banned abortions at 12 weeks of pregnancy. Webber declared the measure to be unconstitutional, stating that it “impermissibly infringes a woman’s Fourteenth Amendment right to elect to terminate a pregnancy before viability.”
“This was one of the most extreme laws passed in 2013 by lawmakers dead-set on taking away a women’s ability to make the best medical decision for herself and her family,” said Talcott Camp, deputy director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project. “We must ensure that this personal medical decision remains where it belongs: not with politicians, but with a woman, her family, and her doctor.”
Democratic Governor Mike Beebe vetoed the bill last year, but Republicans controlling the state legislature overrode the veto with a simple majority vote. The Arkansas law would have banned most abortions at or after 12 weeks of pregnancy if a fetal heartbeat could be detected. Judge Webber had previously ordered a temporary injunction of the law, preventing it from being enforced pending a decision on the law’s constitutionality. Her ruling last week means that the law can never go into effect, although Judge Webber did let stand the law’s mandatory ultrasound requirement.
Several other states are pushing extreme legislation to severely limit access to abortion, including Georgia, North Dakota, and Oklahoma. The consequences of laws targeting access to abortion and women’s reproductive healthcare are being felt acutely in Texas, where dozens of abortion clinics have been forced to close.
Media Resources: ACLU 3/17/14; Reuters 3/15/14; AP 3/14/14; Feminist Newswire 5/21/13, 3/6/14, 3/10/14
