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| File - In this July 9, 2013 file photo, opponents and supporters of an abortion bill hold signs near a news conference outside the Texas Capitol, in Austin, Texas. New abortion restrictions passed by the Texas Legislature are unconstitutional and will not take effect as scheduled on Tuesday, a federal judge has ruled. |
AUSTIN, Texas
(AP) -- A federal judge determined Monday that new Texas abortion
restrictions place an unconstitutional burden on women seeking to end a
pregnancy, a ruling that keeps open dozens of abortion clinics across
the state while officials appeal.
The ruling
by District Judge Lee Yeakel came one day before key parts of the law
the Legislature approved in July were set to take effect. Lawyers for
Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers argued in their lawsuit
that a provision requiring abortion doctors to have admitting privileges
at a hospital less than 30 miles away would have effectively shuttered
about a third of the state's 38 clinics that perform abortions.
Texas
Attorney General Greg Abbott, whose office argued the law protects
women and the life of the fetus, immediately filed an appeal with the
conservative 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans.
"I
have no doubt that this case is going all the way to the United States
Supreme Court," Abbott said during stop in Brownsville, Texas, as part
of his campaign to replace retiring Gov. Rick Perry.
Although
several conservative states in recent months have approved broad
abortion limits, the Texas ones were particularly divisive because of
the number of clinics affected and the distance some women would have to
travel to get an abortion.
Federal judges in
Wisconsin, Kansas, Mississippi and Alabama also have found problems with
state laws prohibiting doctors from conducting abortions if they don't
have hospital admitting privileges.
All the
other appeals - including the one from Mississippi, which like Texas is
within the 5th Circuit - deal only with whether to lift a temporary
injunction preventing the restriction from taking effect. The Texas
appeal could be the first that directly addresses the question of
whether the provision violates the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade ruling
that legalized abortion.
The admitting
privileges provision "does not bear a rational relationship to the
legitimate right of the state in preserving and promoting fetal life or a
woman's health and, in any event, places a substantial obstacle in the
path of a woman seeking an abortion," Yeakel wrote.
In
another part of his ruling, Yeakel, who was appointed by President
George W. Bush, partially blocked the provision requiring doctors to
follow an 18-year-old U.S. Food and Drug Administration protocol. He
found that the state could regulate how a doctor prescribes an
abortion-inducing pill, but the law failed to allow for a doctor to
adjust treatment in order to best protect the health of the woman taking
it.
Abortion-rights supporters complained
that requiring doctors to follow the FDA's original label for an
abortion-inducing drug would deny women the benefit of recent advances
in medical science.
Other portions of the law,
known as House Bill 2, include a ban on abortions after 20 weeks and a
requirement beginning in October 2014 that all abortions take place in a
surgical facility. Neither of those sections was part of this lawsuit.
Amy Hagstrom Miller, president of Whole Woman's Health, said the judge did not go far enough.
"Nearly
40 percent of the women we serve at Whole Woman's Health choose
medication abortion and now Texas is preventing these women from the
advances in medical practice that other women across the United States
will be able to access," she said.
The law
requiring admitting privileges was the biggest obstacle facing abortion
clinics in Texas, and the ruling gives them a temporary reprieve until
new regulations go into effect next year.
Mississippi
passed a similar law last year, which a federal judge also blocked
pending a trial scheduled to begin in March. Mississippi's attorney
general asked the 5th Circuit to lift the temporary injunction so the
law could be enforced, but the judges have left it in place signaling
they believe there is a legitimate constitutional question.
Unlike
the Mississippi case, Yeakel's order is a final decision, setting the
groundwork for the 5th Circuit to review the merits of the law, not just
an injunction against it.
The proposed
restrictions were among the toughest in the nation and gained notoriety
when Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis launched a nearly 13-hour
filibuster against them in June. She is now the only Democrat in the
race for Texas governor.
Davis said the ruling didn't surprise her.
"As
a mother, I would rather see our tax dollars spent on improving our
kid's schools than defending this law," she said in a statement.
During
the trial, officials for one chain of abortion clinics testified that
they've tried to obtain admitting privileges for their doctors at 32
hospitals, but so far only 15 accepted applications and none have
announced a decision. Many hospitals with religious affiliations will
not allow abortion doctors to work there, while others fear protests if
they provide privileges. Many have requirements that doctors live within
a certain radius of the facility, or perform a minimum number of
surgeries a year that must be performed in a hospital.
Beth
Shapiro, chairwoman of board of directors of Lubbock's Planned
Parenthood Women's Health Center, said no hospital in Lubbock has
granted privileges to the lone doctor from East Texas who flies in to do
abortions when there are procedures scheduled. There is not incentive
for hospitals to do so, she said.
"I don't see
why local hospitals would give privileges to someone who's not going to
admit patients," Shapiro said. "I don't see what the business and
financial incentive would be."
