Federal judge says partial-birth abortion ban unconstitutional

[The1calledTKE]

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge today declared the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act unconstitutional, saying the measure infringes on a woman's right to choose.
The ruling applies to Planned Parenthood clinics and their doctors, who perform roughly half the nation's abortions.

U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton's ruling came in one of three lawsuits challenging the legislation President Bush signed last year.

"The act poses an undue burden on a woman's right to choose an abortion," she wrote.

Federal judges in New York and Nebraska also heard challenges to the law earlier this year but have yet to rule.

Bush signed the bill in November, saying "a terrible form of violence has been directed against children who are inches from birth while the law looked the other way."

In the banned procedure — known as intact dilation and extraction to doctors, but called partial-birth abortion by opponents — the living fetus is partially removed from the womb, and its skull is punctured or crushed.

Justice Department attorneys argued that the procedure is inhumane, causes pain to the fetus and is never medically necessary.

Abortion proponents, however, argued that a woman's health during an abortion is more important than how the fetus is terminated, and that the banned method is often a safer solution that a conventional abortion, in which the fetus is dismembered in the womb and then removed in pieces.

for full article see..

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...bortion01.html

[swissmiss04]

Not to split hairs, but aren't ALL unborn children inches from birth?

[Pike1483]

Originally posted by The1calledTKE
SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge today declared the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act unconstitutional, saying the measure infringes on a woman's right to choose.

the living fetus is partially removed from the womb, and its skull is punctured or crushed.

for full article see..

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...bortion01.html

No Suprise that this ruling came out of San Francisco.

[aurora_borealis]

Originally posted by Pike1483
No Suprise that this ruling came out of San Francisco.

The district federal judge sits there, where else would it have come from, Reno?

[James]

Funny

Originally posted by swissmiss04
Not to split hairs, but aren't ALL unborn children inches from birth?

[valkyrie]

Good for Judge Hamilton!

[moe.ron]

Originally posted by aurora_borealis
The district federal judge sits there, where else would it have come from, Reno?

LOL

[Kevin]

Originally posted by aurora_borealis
The district federal judge sits there, where else would it have come from, Reno?

I think he's referring to the fact that the Federal Court in San Francisco has been overturned so many times that they are kind of a joke. It's where lefties go when they want something legislated that would never make it through the standard legislative process.

[DZHBrown]

This is a truly horrible procedure. I know that abortion will always be legal, but partial-birth abortion should not be. I don't understand how ending the life of a viable fetus is not murder. If it was delivered and then promptly killed, it would be murder, so what's the difference?

[mu_agd]

Originally posted by DZHBrown
This is a truly horrible procedure. I know that abortion will always be legal, but partial-birth abortion should not be. I don't understand how ending the life of a viable fetus is not murder. If it was delivered and then promptly killed, it would be murder, so what's the difference?

what about in the situation where giving birth would kill the mother? would you take the fetus's life over hers?

[Kevin]

Originally posted by mu_agd
what about in the situation where giving birth would kill the mother? would you take the fetus's life over hers?

That's not really applicable in the case of partial birth abortions. In a partial birth abortion, the fetus is partially delivered (delivery is induced) and it is killed before it is fully delivered.

Here's a site (obviously biased because it refers to the partially delivered fetus as a "baby"), however, it is basically accurate in describing the procedure.

http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/pba/diagram.html

If you don't want to click the link, here's a text description of what happens (taken from the above site):

1. Guided by ultrasound, the abortionist grabs the baby's leg with forceps.

2. The baby's leg is pulled out into the birth canal.

3. The abortionist delivers the baby's entire body, except for the head.

4. The abortionist jams scissors into the baby's skull. The scissors are then opened to enlarge the hole.

5. The scissors are removed and a suction catheter is inserted. The child's brains are sucked out, causing the skull to collapse. The dead baby is then removed.

---

I'm not saying abortion is right or wrong. I'm still undecided on how I feel about this one. It all (in my mind) goes back to the question of when someone becomes a person. When a fetus must be aborted in this way, there's a good chance they could survive through modern premie technology.

[mu_agd]

ok, thanks.

[honeychile]

Originally posted by ktsnake

I'm not saying abortion is right or wrong. I'm still undecided on how I feel about this one. It all (in my mind) goes back to the question of when someone becomes a person. When a fetus must be aborted in this way, there's a good chance they could survive through modern premie technology.

Here's part of my problem: Friends of mine had a baby delivered at 22 weeks. He spent the first year of his life in the hospital, at the cost of well of $100,000 per day. I'm happy to say that he's healthy & happy at this time!

Yet, if this same child had been unwanted, he would have been nothing but spare parts.

So, how do we decide when a child is a child and not a fetus? When the expentant mother decides it's a child? Or by another method?

[Rudey]

Hey Kev thanks for grossing me out.

And why don't the women just get the abortion earlier??

I don't care as much for this though because I'm waiting until marriage.

-Rudey

[mu_agd]

Originally posted by Rudey

And why don't the women just get the abortion earlier??

possibly because they may not find out there is something wrong with the baby until that late in stage.