The Thomas More Society filed a lawsuit this week with the Illinois Supreme Court that seeks immediate enforcement of a parental notification law in the state. The notification law was scheduled to go into effect on August 5th, but its implementation was delayed by a 90-day moratorium approved by the state’s Department of Financial and Professional Regulation to allow medical professionals to familiarize themselves with the law, reported the New York Times.
The law in question mandates that physicians notify a young woman’s parents at least 48 hours before performing abortions on women 17 or younger. Illinois law does not require that parents consent regarding the abortion, only that they are notified.
The law originally passed in 1984 and was updated in 1995, but was held up for years by legal challenges. A Chicago federal appeals court ruled in July that the law is constitutional. In its decision, the court described the law as “a permissible attempt to help a young woman make an informed choice about whether to have an abortion”.
Lorie Chaiten of ACLU Illinois, who fought against the law, told the Associated Press after the state Supreme Court’s decision that the parental notification requirement “creates unnecessary, dangerous hurdles to accessing essential health care for young women facing unintended pregnancy in the state of Illinois”.
