Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Supreme Court Upholds Federal Partial Birth Abortion Technique Ban

The slip opinion has not yet been posted, so I can comment only on the breaking AP report for now.

Abortion opponents, among whom I include myself, should properly greet any retreat from the Court's abortion cases beginning with Row v. Wade as good news of a sort. (And, of course, vice versa for abortion rights advocates.) Still, it is worth noting, first, that the surgical technique under consideration here is used in only a handful of the over one million abortions performed in the U.S. every year and, second, that as the AP reports:
The procedure at issue involves partially removing the fetus intact from a woman's uterus, then crushing or cutting its skull to complete the abortion.

Abortion opponents say the law will not reduce the number of abortions performed because an alternate method _ dismembering the fetus in the uterus _ is available and, indeed, much more common.

That latter is, of course, a matter of dispute. (When it comes to abortion, what isn't?) Still, it must be taken as small comfort from the near-term human being involved that, while her death may no longer be effected by having her skull crushed, getting the job done by dismemberment remains a "viable" option.

More, no doubt, later.

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