The Supreme Court, and abortion.

[Cooked Crack]

 

 

[LadySkinsFan]

3 hours ago, Cooked Crack said:

 

 

 

Women in Texas now officially are second class citizens. I really hate this state. Republican Death Cult, Texas Chapter, a hex on you. (This from an atheist)

[Corcaigh]

The Onion still has it:

New Texas Abortion Law Offers $10,000 To Private Citizens For Names Of Anyone They Heard Was A Slut

 

https://www.theonion.com/new-texas-abortion-law-offers-10-000-to-private-citize-1847599390

[Cooked Crack]

 

 

[Destino]

14 hours ago, LadySkinsFan said:

 

Women in Texas now officially are second class citizens. I really hate this state. Republican Death Cult, Texas Chapter, a hex on you. (This from an atheist)

Texas?  Sure looks like the Supreme Court just killed Roe.  Texas is just the start.

 

[Fergasun]

Unfortunately, this is why people wanted RBG to step down when the Dems had Presidency and Senate and why people are asking for Breyer to step down.  

 

Rightly so, we should have a 5-4 liberal Supreme Court with Obama getting to replace RBG and Scalia... 

[redskins59]

 

One thing these republicans want to do is discourage liberals from residing in their stafes so that it remains conservative.  The strategy seems to have worked in Florida.

[tshile]

Correct me where I’m wrong here:

Scotus specifically said they didn’t rule on the constitutionality of it

they ruled on procedural grounds

this can, and will, still be challenged on constitutional grounds

 

now I get that the way it’s playing out has had the impact it’s had. But there’s some super grand statements being made about this that doesn’t seem to make sense. Like that roe v wade is now dead. 
 

scotus is already seeing a case out of another southern state (Mississippi? Louisiana? I forget) on a 15 week abortion ban. Should they find that unconstitutional, then this would also be. 
 

also, I keep hearing from the npr segments that people are leaving the state. Can you, under this Texas law, not be sued for it simply because you left the state?

 

also I don’t get this idea that it’s the law, but the government doesn’t enforce it only citizens do by suing. It makes no sense to me. 

[CjSuAvE22]

Im a moderate leaning conservative and this whole abortion thing needs to be set aside its done women need access to these things regardless of what religion says and the science backed behind it. I dont know why time is even spent on this anymore in this regard some members of the GOP need a reality check.

[Simmsy]

I see a lot of frivolous lawsuits packing Texas courts. What a **** hole of a state, where are are these corporations that were supposed to stand up to this garbage?

[China]

Texas's Abortion Law Banning Dilation and Evacuation Will Kill and Maim Women

 

Sometimes a pregnancy half fails. The membranes rupture before viability and an infection sets up shop in the uterus. Medically, the pregnancy has to end; whether the fetus is still alive or not does not matter. If an infected uterus is left unevacuated, the bacteria will eventually spread to the blood stream and it will be fatal. This is fact.

 

At times the body offers a consolation and goes into labor. It doesn’t seem like it at the time but it is more than a small mercy. When the uterus does not start contracting the patient has to choose: drugs to induce labor or a surgical procedure called dilation and evacuation (D&E). It is like starring in a horror movie where you choose the weapon.

 

Labor is labor. It hurts and can take days. A premature uterus, especially an infected one, often does not cooperate. Days of both grieving and waiting to grieve break even the strongest. No one has assigned fault, in fact everyone has said the opposite, but the pathways of sadness and self-doubt and blame cut deeper and deeper with each taunting contraction. A brain fuddled by lack of sleep, medication side effects, days without fresh air, and the stench of sweat from the bed sheets cannot possibly reframe this experience. When women tell me they “can’t even get this right” I want to cry.

 

At the end of the labor there is a baby. Often bruised and macerated. Many find that visual very hard as technically those injuries were caused by their own body. As a doctor you can try to explain it away as predicted medical consequences, which they are, but your words are repelled by a force field of despair. Sometimes the baby survives the infection and the traumatic labor and delivery and then the patient has to decide if she is able to hold her baby until death comes or if she is not. These things shatter people.

 

The other medical option is a D&E, a surgical procedure to remove the pregnancy through the cervix. It requires more skill, medically speaking, than the labor. You only come by this skill if you have done a lot of second trimester abortions because that is exactly what it is, but harder because an infected uterus has the consistency of soft butter. Your instruments are like a hot knife. You are using a hot knife to remove sharp fragments from a bed of soft butter. Do it incorrectly and you damage the uterus, puncture the bowel, or cause catastrophic blood loss. The fact that your patient is already ill with infection makes every potential sequelae worse.

 

A D&E bypasses all of the emotional trauma of the labor and the decisions that come afterward about holding the body. The patient gets an anesthetic and afterward the physical part of the nightmare is over. Sometimes, if the infection is advanced, the medical team may recommend a D&E up front. The risks of a D&E performed by a well-trained individual are very low.

 

Click on the link for more

[bearrock]

8 minutes ago, tshile said:

Correct me where I’m wrong here:

Scotus specifically said they didn’t rule on the constitutionality of it

they ruled on procedural grounds

this can, and will, still be challenged on constitutional grounds

 

now I get that the way it’s playing out has had the impact it’s had. But there’s some super grand statements being made about this that doesn’t seem to make sense. Like that roe v wade is now dead. 
 

 

While you are correct that SCOTUS' refusal to grant emergency injunction may not necessarily mean that Roe and Casey will be overturned, it is a pretty clear sign and significant departure from a history of consistently enjoining laws that restrict abortion rights while the case is pending.

 

Though the procedural hair splitting is over the enforcement mechanism (via private lawsuit as opposed to some kind of civil or criminal penalty by the government), imagine how the court would've reacted if such law was designed to infringe on some other constitutional right.  Right to sue anyone for buying a gun?  Right to sue someone for attending church?  Right to sue someone for bad-mouthing the president?  It's hard to imagine any scenario in which a law that attempts to skirt the governmental infringement prong of the constitutional right by private enforcement would not be laughed straight out of court.  But this is about abortion and here we are.

 

Quote

scotus is already seeing a case out of another southern state (Mississippi? Louisiana? I forget) on a 15 week abortion ban. Should they find that unconstitutional, then this would also be. 

 

Probably.  But should the court actually decide that private infringement of a constitutional right, even if endorsed by the government and enforced through the legal system, is a valid way for the state to act through individuals where the state could not, you could have abortion be legal but have a huge backdoor by which it is made illegal.  Then again, no other constitutional rights would have any meaning either because every right could simply squashed by allowing private right of litigation (it's also unclear if TX law prohibits multiple suits for each violation.  I haven't seen anything that does it.  Theoretically, an abortion provider could be sued by every person and entity in the world separately for a single abortion and each litigant would be entitled to a minimum of 10K judgment).

 

Quote

also, I keep hearing from the npr segments that people are leaving the state. Can you, under this Texas law, not be sued for it simply because you left the state?

 

 

Unless there's a territorial restriction on the law, the only limitation would be jurisdictional limit placed by the constitution.  This law doesn't allow suit against the person getting the abortion, it's against people who aid and abet.  A person driving the person getting the abortion across state border for abortion would probably be fine to sue.  Lawsuit against a provider performing abortion in a different state, without something more like advertising in TX, would likely fail to pass muster under minimum contact required for exercise of personal jurisdiction over the provider in Texas court due to constitutional jurisprudence on personal jurisdiction.

 

No worries though.  The amount of time that other anti-abortion states would pass similar laws can probably timed with an egg timer. 

 

Quote

also I don’t get this idea that it’s the law, but the government doesn’t enforce it only citizens do by suing. It makes no sense to me.

 

It shouldn't to the Supreme Court either.  But SCOTUS allowed the law to go into effect, so it's either a signal for Roe/Casey getting overturned or they are about to make a mockery of constitutional rights.  I wonder how many liberal states will follow suit with private enforcement against gun owners?

[LD0506]

[Fan since a Fetus]

.

Edited October 23, 2023 by Fan since a Fetus

[No Excuses]

What’s stopping states from enacting any unconstitutional law under this nonsense regulatory scheme where the state passes of its enforcement responsibility to private citizens?  
 

California should consider a law that bans the possession of most guns, and allows private citizens to sue gun owners for possession. 
 

There is little chance this stands long term but let’s have some fun with it along the way at least. 

Edited September 2, 2021 by No Excuses

[LadySkinsFan]

1 hour ago, bearrock said:

 

While you are correct that SCOTUS' refusal to grant emergency injunction may not necessarily mean that Roe and Casey will be overturned, it is a pretty clear sign and significant departure from a history of consistently enjoining laws that restrict abortion rights while the case is pending.

 

Though the procedural hair splitting is over the enforcement mechanism (via private lawsuit as opposed to some kind of civil or criminal penalty by the government), imagine how the court would've reacted if such law was designed to infringe on some other constitutional right.  Right to sue anyone for buying a gun?  Right to sue someone for attending church?  Right to sue someone for bad-mouthing the president?  It's hard to imagine any scenario in which a law that attempts to skirt the governmental infringement prong of the constitutional right by private enforcement would not be laughed straight out of court.  But this is about abortion and here we are.

 

 

Probably.  But should the court actually decide that private infringement of a constitutional right, even if endorsed by the government and enforced through the legal system, is a valid way for the state to act through individuals where the state could not, you could have abortion be legal but have a huge backdoor by which it is made illegal.  Then again, no other constitutional rights would have any meaning either because every right could simply squashed by allowing private right of litigation (it's also unclear if TX law prohibits multiple suits for each violation.  I haven't seen anything that does it.  Theoretically, an abortion provider could be sued by every person and entity in the world separately for a single abortion and each litigant would be entitled to a minimum of 10K judgment).

 

 

Unless there's a territorial restriction on the law, the only limitation would be jurisdictional limit placed by the constitution.  This law doesn't allow suit against the person getting the abortion, it's against people who aid and abet.  A person driving the person getting the abortion across state border for abortion would probably be fine to sue.  Lawsuit against a provider performing abortion in a different state, without something more like advertising in TX, would likely fail to pass muster under minimum contact required for exercise of personal jurisdiction over the provider in Texas court due to constitutional jurisprudence on personal jurisdiction.

 

No worries though.  The amount of time that other anti-abortion states would pass similar laws can probably timed with an egg timer. 

 

 

It shouldn't to the Supreme Court either.  But SCOTUS allowed the law to go into effect, so it's either a signal for Roe/Casey getting overturned or they are about to make a mockery of constitutional rights.  I wonder how many liberal states will follow suit with private enforcement against gun owners?

 

Thank you for your very detailed discussion of this law. It's truly frightening. Heather Cox Richardson also wrote a very detailed explanation of this law. I really really hate this state.

[PleaseBlitz]

And this, folks, is why people needed to vote for Hillary even if she didn’t make them all tingly.

[TheDoyler23]

3 minutes ago, LadySkinsFan said:

 

Thank you for your very detailed discussion of this law. It's truly frightening. Heather Cox Richardson also wrote a very detailed explanation of this law. I really really hate this state.

 

Part of me thinks that Texas is passing as many laws like this as possible as a deterrence to liberals from moving to the state. 

[Spaceman Spiff]

Funny how the GOP fancies itself as the party of "freedoms and liberties" and yet they move to infringe upon them whenever possible.

 

[88Comrade2000]

If this law stands; then I see states where gop has full control, passing the same law.

 

This surely will be an issue in 22.

[Ball Security]

10 minutes ago, TheDoyler23 said:

 

Part of me thinks that Texas is passing as many laws like this as possible as a deterrence to liberals from moving to the state. 

Yes, that’s definitely part of the equation.

[No Excuses]

3 minutes ago, Ball Security said:

Yes, that’s definitely part of the equation.

They are going to lose a lot of businesses that need college-educated people if this is really their end goal. You can bet that yuppies in big cities who have fueled the growth of the state in recent years are going to be letting their displeasure known. 
 

In an extremely hot labor market for educated, tech workers, I wouldn’t want to be a business whose employees are looking to take jobs in states that better align with their values. 

Edited September 2, 2021 by No Excuses

[TheGreatBuzz]

8 minutes ago, Rdskns2000 said:

If this law stands; then I see states where gop has full control, passing the same law.

 

This surely will be an issue in 22.

 

Don't you want to use this as another example that the end of civilization is coming or something rosy like that?

[Llevron]

1 minute ago, TheGreatBuzz said:

 

Don't you want to use this as another example that the end of civilization is coming or something rosy like that?

Swear I thought the same thing 

[gbear]

I have a question as I read the section outlawing abortion "does not apply to a physician who performs a partial-birth abortion that is necessary to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, physical illness, or physical injury, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy."

 

Isn't pregnancy itself a life-endangering physical condition?  I mean we still have mortality rates women in childbirth listed in the WHO report every year, and the U.S. is not the safest place to give birth...