Alabama GOP Gov. Kay Ivey approved a package of sweeping abortion regulations Wednesday, teeing up a legal fight over Roe v. Wade some believe may…
Alabama GOP Gov. Kay Ivey approved a package of sweeping abortion regulations Wednesday, teeing up a legal fight over Roe v. Wade some believe may reach the Supreme Court.
Whether the Alabama law will even reach the Supreme Court on the merits is an open question, though there are two abortion controversies from Indiana and Louisiana on which the justices may act in the coming months.
Mandatory ultrasounds, disposal regulations for fetal remains, and bans on trait-selective abortion
Vice President Mike Pence signed a battery of abortion regulations into law during his tenure as governor of Indiana. Those mandates require women to have an ultrasound 18 hours before terminating a pregnancy, compel medical professionals to cremate or bury fetal remains, and ban abortions on the basis of sex, race, or disability.
The 7th U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against all three regulations over two different decisions. The first case touched the disposal mandate and the trait-selective abortion ban, which supporters refer to as an anti-eugenics law. A three-judge panel unanimously struck down the trait-selective ban and found against the disposal rules 2-1.
The full 7th Circuit elected to review the panel ruling in June 2018, but reversed course after Judge Michael Scudder recused himself from the matter. Scudder’s recusal left the court evenly divided, so the decision was upheld.
That result drew a dissent from Judge Frank Easterbrook, who was skeptical that current precedent forbids the Indiana ban on race, sex, or disability selective abortions. He was more direct with the fetal remains requirements, criticizing the court for striking down those rules under a highly permissive legal standard.
The panel said Indiana had not identified a rational basis for the regulations, since fetuses do not qualify as human beings and thus cannot be regulated like persons under law.
