Baby Killers in MS Handed Victory by 5th Circuit Panel
By Gina Miller
AmericanClarion.com
The culture of death was given a win on Tuesday when
a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against
the 2012 Mississippi law that requires abortion
“doctors” to have admitting privileges at local
hospitals. Therefore, Mississippi’s last
remaining abortion mill in Jackson can continue to
practice its baby killing.
The Jackson
Free Press reported on Tuesday:
The Jackson Women’s Health
Organization was unable to obtain the privileges and
challenged the constitutionality of the law in court
and succeeded in obtaining an injunction against the
law in federal court.
The court only found the law
unconstitutional as it was applied in Mississippi to
the last abortion clinic, since it would have made
abortion inaccessible in the entire state.
According to the standard set
forth in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, a state cannot
create laws or regulations regarding abortion that
has the purpose or effect of imposing an “undue
burden,” defined as a “substantial obstacle in the
path of a woman seeking an abortion before the fetus
attains viability.”
A different panel of the same court upheld an
identical law in Texas that closed abortion clinics
and left a longer distance for women to travel to
obtain an abortion than some women in Mississippi
would have to travel to reach an out-of-state
abortion mill. This ruling was political and
arbitrary, because “undue burden” was defined as the
majority wanted it to be.
Circuit Judge Emilio Garza wrote in his dissent:
By arbitrarily confining its
undue burden analysis to Mississippi, the majority
departs not only from the concept of a
constitutional right to travel, but importantly from
the text “any person” in the Due Process Clause. In
assessing whether a state law unduly burdens the
abortion right, courts must be able to consider the
availability of abortion services in neighboring
states. Accordingly, I cannot conclude, as the
majority does, that our analysis must “focu[s]
solely on the effects within the regulating state,”…
or that [Jackson Women's Health Organization] has
shown a substantial likelihood H.B. 1390 imposes an
undue burden merely by causing women to travel to an
adjacent state to obtain abortion services.
… Even accepting that the
majority’s factors somehow narrow its holding, I
find its ad hoc approach to be unworkable. The
majority does not even attempt to explain how this
case’s “factual context,” the “statutory provision”
at issue, and the “nature and process” of the
admitting-privileges requirement purportedly combine
to make this burden “undue.”… The message for future
courts and litigants is that a law causing the
closure of all abortion providers in a state imposes
an undue burden—unless it does not impose such a
burden. The use of such an unprincipled approach to
strike down as unconstitutional a state’s exercise
of its sovereign power to protect its citizens is
particularly troubling.
Yes, the ruling is certainly “troubling,” especially
considering the nature of Mississippi’s law.
It simply required that these people who surgically
kill pre-born babies must be able to admit women to
local hospitals in the event that something goes
even more wrong than a dead, tiny baby in a
bio-waste bucket. It would seem that these
death worshipers are, at the very least,
disingenuous when they clamor and rail about
“women’s health” yet viciously oppose a legal
protection for women’s health.
Mississippi Republican Governor Phil Bryant released
a statement in response to the ruling:
“I am disappointed that two
judges concluded that HB 1390 is unconstitutional.
This measure is designed to protect the health and
safety of women who undergo this potentially
dangerous procedure, and physicians who provide
abortions should be held to the same standards as
physicians who perform other outpatient procedures.
“It is important to note that
today’s opinion was issued by a divided panel of
judges and not by the entire Fifth Circuit and that
this action is just another part of the legal
process. I will continue working with the Attorney
General as his office petitions the entire court to
hear this case.”
Yes, hopefully this case will be reviewed by the
entire 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals,
and hopefully an opposite ruling will be achieved.
We look forward to one day seeing the last remaining
abortion mill in Mississippi shut down for good.