Here we go. CNN reports:
The Supreme Court wasted little time jumping back into the contentious abortion issue, agreeing Tuesday to review the constitutionality of a federal law banning a controversial late-term procedure critics call “partial birth” abortion.
The case could provide a judicial sea change with new Justice Samuel Alito, who joined the high court January 31, replacing Sandra Day O’Connor.
O’Connor, the first woman on the high court, was a key swing vote for a quarter century, upholding the basic right to abortion.
The views of Alito, a more conservative jurist, could prove crucial in the new debate.
A federal appeals court had ruled against the government, saying the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Act of 2003 was unconstitutional because it did not provide a health exception to pregnant women facing a medical emergency.
The administration actually argued that a woman can never have her health threatened by a pregnancy. As to future fertility, they simply don’t care.
On the federal late-term abortion law, the Justice Department urged the justices to accept the case, saying the lower courts viewed the issue incorrectly.
“That decision overrides Congress’s carefully considered finding, following nine years of hearings and debates, that partial-birth abortion is never necessary to preserve a mother’s health,” Solicitor General Paul Clement said in a legal brief.
Meanwhile:
South Dakota’s state Senate plans to vote Wednesday on a controversial bill to ban abortion in nearly all cases — except to protect the life of the mother.
The assault is neverending.
