SD bans almost all abortions

Forums: Politics, Abortion, South Dakota
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CNN headline

PIERRE, South Dakota (AP) -- Gov. Mike Rounds signed legislation Monday banning nearly all abortions in South Dakota, setting up a court fight aimed at challenging the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion.

The bill would make it a crime for doctors to perform an abortion unless the procedure was necessary to save the woman's life. It would make no exception for cases of rape or incest.

Planned Parenthood, which operates the state's only abortion clinic, in Sioux Falls, has pledged to challenge the measure in court. (Read the text of the law)

Rounds issued a written statement saying he expects the law will be tied up in court for years and will not take effect unless the Supreme Court upholds it.

"In the history of the world, the true test of a civilization is how well people treat the most vulnerable and most helpless in their society. The sponsors and supporters of this bill believe that abortion is wrong because unborn children are the most vulnerable and most helpless persons in our society. I agree with them," Rounds said in the statement.

The governor declined all media requests for interviews Monday.

The Legislature passed the bill last month after supporters argued that the recent appointment of conservative justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito have made the Supreme Court more likely to overturn Roe v. Wade.

South Dakota's abortion ban is to take effect July 1, but a federal judge is likely to suspend it during a legal challenge.

Rounds has said abortion opponents already are offering money to help the state pay legal bills for the anticipated court challenge. Lawmakers said an anonymous donor has pledged $1 million to defend the ban, and the Legislature set up a special account to accept donations for legal fees.

Under the new law, doctors could get up to five years in prison for performing an illegal abortion.

Rounds previously issued a technical veto of a similar bill passed two years ago because it would have wiped out all existing restrictions on abortion while the bill was tied up for years in a court challenge.

The statement he issued Monday noted that this year's bill was written to make sure existing restrictions will be enforced during the legal battle. Current state law sets increasingly stringent restrictions on abortions as pregnancy progresses. After the 24th week, the procedure is allowed only to protect the woman's health and safety.

About 800 abortions are performed each year in South Dakota. Planned Parenthood has said other women cross state lines to reach clinics.

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Type: Discussion • Score: 1 • Views: 2,754 • Replies: 37

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Bookmarking.

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MOAN means to say that she is lying in wait . . . nothing yet for her to attack in any response post . . .

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Another reason not to live in South Dakota.

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That law, if passed, will change the child poverty statistics in the US.

http://www.unicef.org.nz/advocacy/publications/Report_Card_-_Poverty_1.pdf

http://www.unicef.org/sowc06/pdfs/figure2_4_2005.pdf

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Setanta Mouthed Off:

[quote]MOAN means to say that she is lying in wait . . . nothing yet for her to attack in any response post . . . [/quote]

No, actually I meant I really don't know how I feel about this right now and would like to read a bit more and do some thinking on it. Rolling Eyes

But, since it's obvious you are going to make this other than what Questioner intends it to be, I am withdrawing in respect to him and others.

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I don't know that it will change the statistics of child poverty in the United States. It is true, however, that the majority of recipients of Aid to Dependent Children are white, and rural--rather than the stereotype of black, urban welfare mothers.

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If abortion become illegal:

1. The rich will fly to Europe or a tropical island and have it done.
2. The middle class will go to Mexico or Canada.
3. The poor will go back to doing it with crochet needles and hangers or they will keep the baby (since single motherhood is no longer a stigma) and end up needing more gov't assistance than ever before.

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I can see it now, here come the floods of neo contentious objectors to Canada as a pseudo civil war over woman's rights erupts.

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Rounds became governor in 2003, which relates to another
year of medieval reign.
The people of SD are hopefully smarter and elect a new candidate from this century in 2007.

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Green Witch wrote:

If abortion become illegal:

1. The rich will fly to Europe or a tropical island and have it done.
2. The middle class will go to Mexico or Canada.
3. The poor will go back to doing it with crochet needles and hangers or they will keep the baby (since single motherhood is no longer a stigma) and end up needing more gov't assistance than ever before.

Why is it that education, safe sex, and personal responsibility never makes these lists?

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Whom the electorate choose for their Governor is not relevant. The Legislature must pass the legislation before the Governor can sign it. Either the electorate of South Dakota is happy with the crew at the State House and the passage of bill such as this, or they are going to turn the bums out this year, regardless of how the Governor fares in the election.

I suspect that such a bill is not too far from the opinions of a majority of the electorate, because the Legislature passed it. Even if the electorate is now pissed, and changes the complexion of the Legislature--the damage is done as soon as any challenge to this law enters the Federal court system.

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Quote:

Why is it that education, safe sex, and personal responsibility never makes these lists?

McGentrix - In a perfect world, all that you have mentioned, would be enough to make an abortions unnecessary. Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world, and mistakes are made.

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I sooo agree with Phoenix. I would love to see every person take responsibility for their reproduction and thus abortion would just go away, but it's just not going to happen.

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Witch is right. This law affects the poor more than most. So does the price of anything. That is sort of what "poor" means.

At any rate, I am glad that SD has taken the plunge here, so that some countrywide definition of legal abortion can be created, or, in the absence of that, the question will be given to the states to resolve individually.

The debate about abortion wouldn't be nearly as heated if the choice side hadn't gone NRA on ANY limitations to abortion.

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Re: SD bans almost all abortions

Questioner wrote:

CNN headline

......About 800 abortions are performed each year in South Dakota. Planned Parenthood has said other women cross state lines to reach clinics.

yeah. like it's a real epidemic.

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McGentrix wrote:

Green Witch wrote:
If abortion become illegal:

1. The rich will fly to Europe or a tropical island and have it done.
2. The middle class will go to Mexico or Canada.
3. The poor will go back to doing it with crochet needles and hangers or they will keep the baby (since single motherhood is no longer a stigma) and end up needing more gov't assistance than ever before.

Why is it that education, safe sex, and personal responsibility never makes these lists?

most likely because states that are willing to sign a no-abortion bill are also not too likely to allow anything in sex ed beyond abstinence.

don't know about you, dude, but when i was a kid, every teenager i knew was lookin' to score. boys and girls both. and even then, about the only way to get condoms was to snag 'em from the parents (if they used them) or to whine at an older kid to toss ya one. which of course was never enough.

the first time a teen tries to put one of those damn things on usually ends in something looking like a devastated balloon....

if ballons had ridges, that is. Laughing

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Politically this is a very bad thing for conservatives-- it is similar to Gay Marriage for liberals.

It is quite possible that the Massachusetts SJC, when they legalized gay marriage, single-handedly gave Bush the election. This issue galvanized the right (and plenty of the middle).

So now we have South Dakota making abortion illegal... confirming one of the strongest arguments for voting Democratic.

This issue will galvanize the left and plenty of the middle.

As a progressive, I felt that legalizing gay marriage was the right thing in spite of the political cost-- but it was a very difficult situation to be in.

I am very happy to see the right put in the same situation-- and I am gleefully waiting for the inevitable backlash.

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ebrown_p wrote:

Politically this is a very bad thing for conservatives-- it is similar to Gay Marriage for liberals.

It is quite possible that the Massachusetts SJC, when they legalized gay marriage, single-handedly gave Bush the election. This issue galvanized the right (and plenty of the middle).

So now we have South Dakota making abortion illegal... confirming one of the strongest arguments for voting Democratic.

This issue will galvanize the left and plenty of the middle.

As a progressive, I felt that legalizing gay marriage was the right thing in spite of the political cost-- but it was a very difficult situation to be in.

I am very happy to see the right put in the same situation-- and I am gleefully waiting for the inevitable backlash.

Astute observation. Also -- not giving exceptions for rape or incest (which the vast majority of Americans do support) -- gives the whole thing an incredibly mean-spirited feel. Love or hate abortion, support or want to quash it, but it's hard to argue that it's best for a 14-year-old child to have her father's baby, and that, for some odd reason, the rights of the unborn are somehow paramount to hers. Surely that 14-year-old is a victim. For all of the rhetoric about how this law is supposed to protect "victims", it sure does nothing to protect that 14-year-old.

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Given that rape and incest were not mentioned as exclusions, I doubt this law will stand.

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SD bans almost all abortions

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