Judge: Late-term abortion law unconstitutional
Federal ruling cites lack of health exception
NEW YORK (AP) -- In a highly anticipated ruling, a federal judge found the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act unconstitutional Thursday because it does not include a health exception.
U.S. District Judge Richard C. Casey in Manhattan said the Supreme Court has made it clear that a law that prohibits the performance of a particular abortion procedure must include an exception to preserve a woman's life and health.
While the measure did not provide a health exception, it appeared to provide some exception if a mother's life is endangered by pregnancy.
According to the text of the law, the form of abortion is not banned if it is "necessary to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, physical illness, or physical injury, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself."
Casey issued the ruling two months after hearing closing arguments in the case.
A San Francisco judge has already declared the 2003 law unconstitutional, and a judge in Lincoln, Nebraska, is still considering the question. The three judges suspended the ban while they held the trials.
When he signed the law, President Bush said he would use every legal avenue to fight anyone trying to block its enforcement.
The law was aimed at stopping a procedure, usually performed during the second trimester of pregnancy, in which a fetus is partly delivered, its skull punctured and its brain removed, often by suction.
Opponents, including Republicans in Congress who pushed for the ban, call the procedure "partial-birth abortion," but abortion rights groups and many doctors refer to it as "intact dilation and evacuation."
Since 1995, similar bans against this form of abortion have been enacted in more than half the states. They have been challenged in courts throughout the country.
The American Civil Liberties Union says courts considering these laws -- including the U.S. Supreme Court just three years ago -- have consistently struck down the bans because they do not take into account risks to the women's health.
