Politics
Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Stands
By Melissa Charbonneau
CBN News
April 21, 2007
CBNNews.com - Emotions outside the court ran high over the monumental five-to-four ruling that a partial birth abortion ban does not violate a woman's "constitutional right to abortion."
"It's been a long time coming, and make no mistake about it, this decision is is the beginning of the end of Roe vs. Wade, and it's the start of a new era for the respect of our God-given right to life," said Rev. Robert Schenk.
"I think it should only be used if the mom is, in terms of death or something like that, for extreme," said Vincent Poole. "But outside of that, I believe in right to life and I am just totally against it."
Hannah Shreefter said, "I think it's a huge step back for our nation and mankind in general, that we see the fetuses as complete beings, completely disregarding a women's right to what happens inside her own body."
"If she needs to get an abortion she should be allowed to one," said Myaisha Hayes. "Someone telling her what she should do with her own body shouldn't be allowed."
Abortion rights groups launched their legal challenge after President Bush in 2003 signed the ban on a procedures critics call infanticide.
Clinically called dilation and extraction, it's performed in the second and third trimesters, the baby is partially delivered out of the birth canal, the skull is then punctured, and the brains are suctioned out.
The narrow decision revealed a shift in the court's direction. Liberal justices pitted against against conservatives, with the majority hinging on Bush appointees Chief Justice John Roberts and Samuel Alito.
Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy voiced concern over patients not getting information on "the way the fetus is killed."
He wrote that the "medical profession... may find different and less shocking methods to abort the fetus in the second trimester."
Writing in the minority, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg called the decision "alarming," saying it it "applauds federal intervention to ban a procedure found necessary in certain cases."
Abortion rights group Planned Parenthood coming out against the decision saying it "tells women that politicians, not doctors, will make their health care decisions for them," said Eve Gartner.
President Bush issued a statement of praise for the court, saying he'll "continue to work for the day when every child is welcomed in life and protected in law."
Both sides of the life debate now look to the 2008 elections, knowing they'll not only decide who will sit in the White House, but who will sit on the nation's highest court and direct the abortion decisions for decades.
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