Judge rules Ariz. 20-wk. abortion ban may take effect

Getty Images

Updated at 3:59 p.m. ET

(AP) PHOENIX - Arizona's ban on abortions starting at 20 weeks of pregnancy will take effect this week as scheduled after a federal judge ruled Monday that the new law is constitutional, but reproductive rights groups hope to challenge the decision with an emergency appeal.

U.S. District Judge James Teilborg said the statute may prompt a few pregnant women who are considering abortion to make the decision earlier. But he said the new law is constitutional because it doesn't prohibit any women from making the decision to end their pregnancies.

The judge also wrote that the state provided "substantial and well-documented" evidence that an unborn child has the capacity to feel pain during an abortion by at least 20 weeks.

Republican Gov. Jan Brewer signed the measure into law in April, making Arizona one of 10 states to enact types of 20-week bans.

Arizona's ban, set to take effect Thursday, prohibits abortions starting at 20 weeks of pregnancy except in medical emergencies. That is a change from the state's current ban at viability, which is the ability to survive outside the womb and which generally is considered to be about 24 weeks. A normal pregnancy lasts about 40 weeks.

The New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights said it and another group that challenged the law plan to file an emergency appeal of Monday's decision with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

"Today's decision casts aside decades of legal precedent, ignoring constitutional protections for reproductive rights that have been upheld by the United States Supreme Court for nearly 40 years and threatening women's health and lives," said Nancy Northup, the center's president and CEO.

Teilborg held a hearing Wednesday on a request from abortion-rights groups that he temporarily block the law's enforcement.

The abortion-rights groups' lawyer said during the hearing that the ban crosses a clear line on what U.S. Supreme Court rulings permit, and it intrudes on women's health decisions at a key point in pregnancy. Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery said the state Legislature was justified in enacting the ban to protect the health of women and shield fetuses from pain.

A second Arizona anti-abortion law enacted earlier this year also faces a court challenge. That law would bar public funding for non-abortion health care provided by abortion doctors and clinics.

Both anti-abortion laws are among many approved by Arizona's Republican-led Legislature. The other laws include restrictions on clinic operations, mandates for specific disclosures and a prohibition on a type of late-term abortion.

Attorney Janet Crepps of the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights argued at Wednesday's hearing that under Supreme Court decisions starting with the 1973 Roe vs. Wade ruling that legalized abortion, states can only regulate how abortions are performed, not ban them, before a fetus is viable.

Montgomery said that not implementing the 20-week ban would doom fetuses that might be saved due to advances in medicine.

While North Carolina has long had a 20-week ban, Nebraska in 2010 was the first state to recently enact one. Five more states followed in 2010: Alabama, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas and Oklahoma.

Along with Arizona, Georgia and Louisiana approved 20-week bans this year, though Georgia's doesn't take effect until 2013.

The Center for Reproductive Rights said none of the 20-week bans have so far been blocked by courts.

[TreeOfLifeSword]

Mother Teresa warned, Tthe fruit of abortion is nuclear war." She said no one would be safe anywhere if a baby wasn't safe in the womb." She was a true prophet, and heeding her warning would be beneficial to this country. If we choose to ignore it, I have no doubt, we'll live to regret it.

[staghornFern]

People are emotional about birth. However, it is nonsense for people to ignore logic and practicality about abortion. An unborn child is not a person. A fetus is not a functioning person or child. A fetus cannot reason, see or know the world. A fetus is not a social being. A fetus does not have a personality or identity. A fetus is not responsible to anyone and has no societal interaction. A fetus does not have an opinion. Even if a fetus can feel pain, where does this pain go? Nowhere. It is INSIDE the the RESPONSIBLE person. If we follow the logic a fetus is a person we should assign a proportionate degree of responsibility to a child, and we can't; We can't give a child the authority of an adult untill the child IS an adult. Even as adults we can't all assume the same level of responsibility and/or BEING. For the same reason adults don't fight each other for anything their heart desires, kill anybody who causes them pain, waste time in frivolous lawsuits----is the same reason a fetus is not a person. Can you, lawfully, beat up elderly people? Can all elderly people have the same level of responsibility? No, because humans are not apes, we have studied our own development and have learned that there are specific levels of human maturation. If we follow the logic a fetus is a person with a right to life all BORN humans have the right for unending assertion for their right to conquer anything or person. On this EARTH we don't have unending rights to conquer other people, races, nations, brothers, sisters----and the list can go on and on. Abortion is a person's SPIRITUAL issue. If you feel having an abortion is causing pain to a fetus the manisfestation of that pain is intangible and spiritual; It is not in the physical world as evidence. If you feel guilty about it, it is between you and YOUR God. No one can say what punishment is from YOUR God for inflicting what you think is pain upon an unborn fetus. Therefore, the issue should be left up to the individual.

[marychgo]

And just what IS this "substantial and well-documented evidence" that a 20-week-old fetus can feel pain? The existence of nerve cells certainly DOESN'T prove the capacity to feel pain. The human brain is still wiring itself, making connections between brain cells and between the brain and the rest of the body for the first two or three YEARS of life. What's the "substantial and well-documented evidence" that enough of this connection-making has been COMPLETED by the 20th week of pregnancy to allow the fetus to feel pain?

[JustThink789]

I'm very pleased to see this. With all our technical progress, we must remain human, and humane.

"The judge also wrote that the state provided 'substantial and well-documented' evidence that an unborn child has the capacity to feel pain during an abortion by at least 20 weeks."

[andrewjsacks]

Hey, Arizona! There is no God--but there ARE unwanted children who would suffer from neglect.

[ultraskygod]

solo: you are an imbecile. moral ambiguity is not solely with the left, or the right.

[rightone12]

These extreme right wing, religious fanatic, Conservative, Republican, hypocritical, anti-choice whack jobs are so opposed to abortion because they know that if their mothers could go back and do it all over again, they would have aborted these losers. They're always trying to force their deviant views and lifestyle on the rest of us normal people. They love telling other people how to live their lives, while their own lives are complete disasters. So here's the solution to your mental disorder: if you don't like abortion, don't have one. Otherwise keep your mouths shut and don't try to tell another woman what she can and can't do with her own body. Problem solved.

[sdkeller]

I love how right wingers cry about big government, but when it comes to this issue and immigration they are ALL ABOUT some big government. I'm sick of their hypocrisy. If anything should be made illegal it should be stupidity and hypocrisy.

[Mathion]

Oh, good. This way Arizonians (Zonies as we call them) can pay more for welfare and food stamps and medical expenses for the poor and uninsured.

I've never understood the right-wing hypocrisy of lambasting people for not "making their own way" then go off and enact legislation that makes it next to impossible for the very segment of people they despise (the working and unemployed poor) to do it.

But then, if you drink the right-wing (or left wing, for that matter) kool-aid, you've pretty much given up your ability to think rationally anyhow, so it should come as no surprise they'd do irrational things despite the political rhetoric. Guess they need to keep these people down and out so they can keep their favorite scapegoats to use to stir up their voter base.

[canislupus16]

Agree with that one. A woman - and the would-be father if he is around and involved in the decision - should be able to decide within 20 weeks of conception what they're doing. I may be pro-choice, but I'd make it 16 weeks.

[Jaylah54200]

Totally agree.

Sixteen weeks is slightly under four calendar months. If you don't know you're pregnant by the time you're 16 weeks along, there's something wrong. If you're "irregular" and you're doing the thing you have to do to get pregnant, then pay close attention to your calendar and keep a couple of home pregnancy test kits at home.

That still gives you a couple of months to decide what you want to do about it.

It is NEVER up to politicians to make that choice for a woman, but I don't believe in at-will abortions past the first trimester.

[democracy8]

I'm pro-choice as well, but I have to agree too. Close to five months is a very reasonable limit.

[Transatlantique]

There is also evidence of a born child feeling pain during a "circumcision," the euphemism for genital mutilation. What is their point? If they are going to champion the rights of the unborn, then they should champion the rights of the born to genital integrity and keeping their bodies intact as God designed them. The unnecessary procedure called "circumcision" kills around 200 boy yearly, but have they said anything about that? Where is the push for the rights of the born? It exists for the female born, but not the male born. How hypocritical and sad that is, but then again, that is America.