The University of Nebraska Medical Center has agreed to reinstate Dr. LeRoy Carhart to his position as volunteer faculty and pay attorney’s fees in the amount of $65,000, following a settlement announced yesterday. Carhart filed a lawsuit against the University of Nebraska in January 2001, claiming he was fired from his volunteer adjunct professor position following his successful participation in the U.S. Supreme Court case Stenberg v. Carhart. The settlement reached yesterday follows from the April 2001 decision of a federal judge affirming Dr. Carhart’s claims. The federal judge stated that Dr. Carhart’s termination was in fact related to his participation in the U.S. Supreme Court case Stenberg v. Carhart, and that Carhart would most likely succeed in his claim that his First Amendment right to free speech had been violated. In describing the settlement, Dr. Carhart said, “Both the Supreme Court case and this wrongful termination lawsuit have made one principle resoundingly clear: no matter where one stands on the issue of choice, it is illegal to violate an individual’s constitutional rights in pursuit of that belief.” In June 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a very narrow, 5-4 pro-choice decision on Stenberg v. Carhart. Hailed as a victory for women’s rights and the pro-choice movement, the Supreme Court struck down the Nebraska ban on so-called “partial-birth abortions” along with similar bans that had been enacted in 30 states. The Supreme Court ruled that these bans created an “undue burden” on women seeking abortions. The majority of these bans did not include exceptions for the life or health of women, nor did they provide clear guidelines to physicians about which specific abortion procedures could not be used.
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