The Congressional Research Service (CRS) Report for Congress on Jan. 12, 2004 titled "Partial-Birth Abortion: Recent Developments in the Law," explained that:
"In October 2003, Congress approved
S. 3, the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003. The measure was
signed by the President on November 5, 2003... The term 'partial-birth
abortion' refers to a method of abortion commonly called 'dilation and
extraction' or 'D & X' by the medical community. D & X involves
the 'extraction, from the uterus and into the vagina, of all of the
body of a fetus except the head, following which the fetus is killed by
extracting the contents of the skull.' Once the skull is emptied, the
intact fetus is removed from the woman’s body. D & X is one of
several methods of performing abortions. The principal methods of
abortion are suction curettage, induction, and dilation and evacuation
(D & E).
The
decision to perform one abortion method over another usually depends on
the gestational age of the fetus... D & E is the most common method
of abortion in the second trimester... [it]
involves the dilation of the cervix and the dismemberment of the fetus
inside the uterus. Fetal parts are later removed from the uterus either
with forceps or by suction. D & X is typically performed late in
the second trimester between the twentieth and twenty-fourth weeks of
pregnancy. Although the medical advantages of D & X have been
asserted, the nature of the procedure has prompted pro-life advocates
to characterize D & X as something akin to infanticide.
The
procedural similarities between the D & E and D & X procedures
have contributed to the concern that the language of partial-birth
abortion bans may prohibit both methods of abortion."
George W. Bush, 43rd President of the United States, made the following statement on Nov. 5, 2003 before signing the Partial-Birth Abortion Act:
"In passing this legislation, members
of the House and Senate made a studied decision based upon compelling
evidence... In the course of the congressional debate, the facts
became clear. Each year, thousands of partial birth abortions are
committed. As Doctor C. Everett Koop, the pediatrician and former
Surgeon General has pointed out, the majority of partial birth
abortions are not required by medical emergency. As Congress has found,
the practice is widely regarded within the medical profession as
unnecessary, not only cruel to the child, but harmful to the mother,
and a violation of medical ethics. (Applause.)"
National Right to Life Committee's Legislative Director Douglas Johnson wrote a Nov. 5, 2003 paper titled "The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act - Misconceptions and Realities":
"When President Bush signed the
Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act... pro-lifers saw the culmination of an
eight-year struggle led by the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC)
and congressional pro-life leaders...
The bill
would allow the method if it was ever necessary to save a mother's
life... Beyond that, many of the claims of medical 'necessity' for
partial-birth abortion, on closer examination, turn out to involve not
any bona fide risk to a mother's physical health, but rather, a
diagnosis that the baby has Down syndrome or some other disorder that
cannot be cured. The word 'health,' in most of these cases, is really a
euphemism for pre-natal euthanasia...
Nat Hentoff, syndicated columnist, wrote in a Sep. 21, 2004 article titled "Kerry's Judicial ‘Independence’ Has Litmus Tests" in the Jewish World Review that:
"The exception for a woman's health, as very broadly ruled by the Supreme Court in the Doe decision (which struck down a Georgia law essentially requiring three physicians to approve of an abortion), covers 'all factors — physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman's age.'
According to this highly permissive wide-ranging standard, allowing the 'brutal, barbaric and uncivilized' procedure of partial-ban abortion characterizes how this nation, under our rule of law, describes itself as civilized."
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), stated in its June 18, 2003 "Interested Persons Memo: Ban on Safe Abortion Procedures: The So-Called 'Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003'" that:
"The ACLU opposes the so-called
'Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003'... because it outlaws safe
abortion procedures and thus threatens women’s health and reproductive
rights. Proponents of this bill claim that it will prohibit only a
single, 'late-term' abortion procedure. But the bill prohibits more
than a single procedure; it bans safe and common abortion methods used
in the second trimester of pregnancy, well before fetal viability. It
also lacks an exception to protect women’s health -- a requirement that
is constitutionally compelled, as the Supreme Court made clear in its
recent ruling in Stenberg v. Carhart."
Wendy Chavkin, MD, Professor of Clinical Public Health at Columbia University, wrote in a June 30, 2003 article "Chipping Away at Roe," in The Nation magazine that:
"Since 1995 thirty-one states have
enacted bans on 'partial-birth abortion.' Because the broad language
criminalizes commonly used safe procedures and thus interferes with a
woman's right to choose, and because of the lack of a health exception,
the bans were overturned in twenty-one states and struck down by the
Supreme Court in Carhart. The current bill repeats these errors in open
disregard for that decision...
The media have played
along with the right on this issue, adopting the propagandistic term
'partial-birth abortion' and contributing to the misapprehension that
the bill would ban only a single procedure...
[T]he
Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 so violates the doctor-patient
relationship, respect for science and the value of women's lives and
health that organized medicine should fight hard against this
threat..."
Phyllis J. Hamilton, JD, US District Court Northern District of California Judge, in her June 1, 2004 ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Ashcroft, stated:
"[T]he
Act is unconstitutional because it (1) poses an undue burden on a
woman’s ability to choose a second trimester abortion; (2) is
unconstitutionally vague; and (3) requires a health exception as set
forth by the Supreme Court in Stenberg.
Permanent injunctive relief is appropriate given that plaintiffs have
demonstrated that the Act violates their constitutional rights on the
above three bases."
