COLOMBIA – Two of the prosecutors named as defendants in a federal lawsuit challenging the new South Carolina law that prohibits most abortions have argued that a temporary restraining order that prevents the enactment of the law must be dissolved because the law itself “is consistent with the Supreme Court precedent “on abortion issues.
South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson and Walt Wilkins, the prosecutor of two counties in conservative Upstate, wrote in court documents filed on Tuesday that an earlier decision by a higher court upholding a partial birth abortion ban ” suggests that an injunction should be denied here “and that” Law 1 could be maintained by the Court as valid. “
In the Gonzales v. 2007 Carhart, Wilson and Wilkins wrote that US Supreme Court justices rejected the idea that Congress intended to prohibit partial birth in order to “put a substantial obstacle in the way of a woman seeking abortion” in general. Gonzales’ decision, prosecutors argued, appears to indicate that “the ban on a specific form of abortion – even before feasibility – was considered constitutionally acceptable.”
The “South Carolina Fetal Heartbeat and Abortion Protection Act” was suspended by a federal judge last month on its second day in effect, after a planned Paternity and Reproductive Rights Center lawsuit. The measure requires doctors to perform ultrasound to check the fetus for a heartbeat, which can usually be detected about six weeks after conception. If detected, abortion can only be performed if the pregnancy was caused by rape or incest or if the mother is in danger.
Opponents of the ban have argued that many women are unaware that they are pregnant at this time, especially if they are not trying to conceive. And, they argue, with such an early deadline, the law gives women little time to consider whether to have an abortion.
Judge Mary Geiger Lewis initially put into effect a 14-day temporary restraining order, which Planned Parenthood said was needed in part because more than 75 women are scheduled to have an abortion in the state in the next three days, and most of them would be banned under the new law.
Lewis said he will renew the restraining order until a March 9 hearing. This will be done on Planned Parenthood’s request for an injunction suspending the law until the process is resolved.
Governor Henry McMaster signed the bill less than an hour after state lawmakers sent it to him. It is similar to the abortion restriction laws that a dozen states have passed, all of which have been barred from taking effect and are currently tied up in court. Federal law, which takes precedence over state law, currently allows abortion.
The new law does not punish pregnant women for having an illegal abortion, but the person performing the procedure can be charged with a crime, sentenced to up to two years and a $ 10,000 fine if found guilty.
South Carolina has three clinics that offer abortion in its largest metropolitan areas – Charleston, Columbia and Greenville – and none of them perform abortions after the first trimester. Two of them miscarry only twice a week, according to the Planned Parenthood process.