North Dakota Senate approves 6-week abortion ban
Tammi Kromenaker, director of Fargo's Red River Women's Clinic, testifies before the House Human Services Committee on Jan. 31, 2013 in Bismarck, N.D. / AP Photo/James MacPherson
BISMARCK, N.D. The North Dakota Senate on Friday approved banning abortions as early as six weeks into a pregnancy, sending what would be the most stringent abortion restrictions in the U.S. to the state's Republican governor for his signature.
The measure would ban most abortions if a fetal heartbeat can be detected, something that can happen as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. The House already approved the measure. Gov. Jack Dalrymple generally opposes abortion but has not said whether he will sign the bill into law.
It's one of several anti-abortion measures the state Legislature has weighed this session. The vote came with almost no debate in the Senate and after the same chamber approved another measure that would make North Dakota the first to ban abortions based on genetic defects such as Down syndrome.
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That measure would also ban abortion based on gender selection. The Guttmacher Institute, which tracks abortion laws throughout the country, says Pennsylvania, Arizona and Oklahoma already have such laws.
Some supporters of the so-called fetal heartbeat measure have said they hope to send a message that North Dakota is anti-abortion and aims to challenge the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion up until a fetus is considered viable, usually at 22 to 24 weeks.
Abortion-rights advocates say the state should expect a costly legal fight if the bill becomes law.
Arkansas passed a 12-week ban earlier this month that prohibits most abortions when a fetal heartbeat can be detected using an abdominal ultrasound. That ban is scheduled to take effect 90 days after the Arkansas Legislature adjourns.
A fetal heartbeat can generally be detected earlier in a pregnancy using a vaginal ultrasound, but Arkansas lawmakers balked at requiring women seeking abortions to have the more invasive imaging technique.
North Dakota's measure doesn't specify how a fetal heartbeat would be detected. Doctors performing an abortion after a heartbeat is detected could face a felony charge punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. Women having an abortion would not face charges.
A spokeswoman for the Guttmacher Institute, which tracks abortion laws across the country, said North Dakota's measures are the latest in a "tidal wave of abortion restrictions" in the U.S.
"We have seen efforts to ban abortion entirely and those attempts have failed," spokeswoman Elizabeth Nash said. "Now they're moving toward banning abortions as early as possible."
Abortion-rights advocates say the anti-abortion measures in the North Dakota Legislature are attempt to close the state's sole abortion clinic, in Fargo. They also say the so-called fetal heartbeat bill is a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, and its supporters should expect a costly legal fight if it becomes law.
Republican Rep. Bette Grande, an ardent opponent of abortion from Fargo who introduced the fetal heartbeat bill, said fears about potential litigation should not prevent lawmakers from approving the measure.
"Whether this is challenged in court is entirely up to the abortion industry," Grande told lawmakers this week. "Given the lucrative nature of abortion, it is likely that any statute that reduces the number of customers will be challenged by the industry."
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JV: Your "solution" doesn't WORK in the REAL world. My daughter's friend in high school at a baby that was the product of rape at age 14. She WANTED to give the baby up for adoption BUT the rapist REFUSED to sign the papers and claimed he "wanted" the baby so she ended up having to keep the child. Once the creep finishes his prison sentence he will be BACK in this young woman's life because he as "parental rights" and will NEVER go away. Get REAL.
Tell me... Do you feel that ANY horrible crime is only between the perpetrator and God? What about homicide against born people? What about rape?
Stop invoking God's name to support a holocaust.
Thanks.
What is amusing, and completely destroys the supporting rationale of most all "anti-choice" advocates is this; there are so very very few of you on an adoption waiting list, or opening your home to fosterns & orphans unconditionally of race, gender, or disability. If you were, maybe you could stop many abortions--without resorting to slander, libel, or persecution of a woman already faced with one of the hardest decisions she will ever make.
You anti-choice people offer nothing but vileness, seek to take further away the needs that should be available to a mother and her child, cut programs that would benefit either or both, and go further my making a decision for someone that isn't yours to make.
Arrogant, righteous, spiteful, hateful, and mean is all you are. The only compassionate ones are on a waiting list to take-in an unwanted child, unconditionally.
Take some time to actually THINK about what you're supporting. You are either ignorant and brainwashed, or callous and wicked.
Ann Richards Former Texas Governor and Democrat
What if a woman is not taking contraceptives due to being abstinent saving herself for marriage or is a lesbian and is raped and don't want to be forced to give birth to the rapist seed?
What's your solution JV1970?
diagnosis of anencephaly...meaning your baby has a significant brain defect where a significant portion of the brain is missing..and will NEVER develop. Statistically speaking "most" babies do not survive after birth if they are not aborted...BUT SOME DO..I've seen it..what quality of life will this child have? Who is the one being selfish forcing this baby to be born? And why should a family have to carry to term a baby that literally has no quality of life but that may have just enough brain stem left to sustain life....Define "LIFE" is that really life when you are just a breathing body with no brain...
where they go and we'll have a end to unwanted pregnant girls & women