Well that didn't take long. SD Senate votes 23-12 to ban nearly all abortions.

The South Dakota Senate has voted to ban nearly all abortions, including those resulting from incest or rape. The only exceptions would be cases where it’s necessary to protect the mother’s life.

The House passed a similar law earlier, and now they need only work out the differences between the two versions, before it goes to the Governor’s desk for signing. Said Governor is on record as an abortion opponent, but has declined to comment on this legislation for not wanting to influence the legislators’ decisions.

I’m sure that the pro-choice side is already preparing challenges, even though the announcement was made only hours ago. But this full frontal attack on Roe was not expected. Some antichoice activists and politicians have even been hiding their hands, so to speak, asserting that they want to chip away gradually at it rather than aim a cannon point blank. Clearly, at least in South Dakota, this is not the case.

Clearly the conservatives have the upper hand and are not shy about using it. One can only wonder what will come next.

Forgot the link.
Link.

There are many more if you just google “South Dakota abortion ban”.

Well, what does “self-government” mean? Is it not our expression of common will through the legislative process by our elected lawmakers ?

Of course, the laws of a state may not flout the supreme law of the land. However, I - and many others - do not believe that the supreme law of the land should be interpreted to have any voice on the issue of abortion. The supreme law of the land should be correctly interpreted as being silent on the issue of abortion.

Now, that’s not the case just now. But perhaps it will be, soon. And if it is, then we return to a system in which the people, through their elected representatives, make the law they wish, not in conflict with the constitution. It sounds like a good development to me.

I’ll be honest about my position. First of all, I’m pro-choice as you probably guessed. Actually, I’m pro-choice in most things, any number of which have greater potential to affect me personally as I’m male, and my wife and stepdaughter are most unlikely to find themselves “in trouble” as they used to say.

But I see the abortion issue as a weather vane, for it indicates whether to place a decision about one’s own body with that individual, or with the state. Furthermore, if it’s really true that there have been 40 million-odd abortions since 1973, I have to wonder how well we could handle the the pressures of 40 million more people populating this country. In Los Angeles, for instance, we’re barely scraping by with the schools we’ve got now. The possible effect on society of millions of more young people, mostly poor, whose parents didn’t want them in the first place, is not a happy thought.

Of course, far better than abortion is “pre-bortion”, or preventing an unplanned pregnancy in the first place. I’d feel a lot less disturbed about this if I could convince myself that the pro-life side is interested in preventing the need for abortion rather than simply banning the procedure, but IME that’s usually not part their mindset.

The “supreme law of the land” should preserve people’s civil rights, or there’s not much point in having law at all. Preventing women from being reduced to walking wombs qualifies.

The return of Jim Crow, and probably worse is hardly good.

and

Your blatant hypocrisy is amazing. Perhaps you should rephrase your first sentence to "Of course, the laws of a state may not flout the supreme law of the land, unless I disagree with the supreme law of the land.

The next battle will be over the Partial Birth Abortion Act, which the SCOTUS has agreed to hear a case about. This one ought to be interesting, to say the least.

This will die in the SCOTUS. There are 5 guaranteed votes to uphold Roe, and of the 4 remaining, I seriously doubt that Roberts would vote to overturn it either. Thomas almost certainly would overturn it, Scalia might, and Alito might.

It should be noted that no doctor resident in SD will perform abortions today. An elderly doctor from MN flies in once a week to perfrom abortions (it might be more than once a week, but it’s not everyday).

Does anyone have a link that actually shows the bill? The descriptions I’ve seen only say that it bans “most abortions”. Does it only allow for abortions if the life of the mother is in danger?

…ehnnn… AFAIK this one is isn’t very significant as the procedure in question is extremely rare. Even many pro-choicers find late term abortions repugnant.

I apologize. I misread your post as supporting the legislation in South Dakota and, when it should have been supporting the overturning of Roe, Casey, et al. You’re not being hypocritical at this, and I apologize for saying you were.

There is a process for changing the supreme law of the land. There are actually TWO such processes.

I have no hypocrisy here at all. I certainly don’t want a law to flout the Constitution. I DO want the understanding of what the Constitution means to change. Since the original decision in this regard is, in my view, flawed, why shouldn’t I be eager to see it overturned?

Now, there is actually a second way of changing the Constitution. People that want to enshrine abortion as a protected civil right should avail themselves of that second method, which involves super-majorities in the Congress and of the state legislatures. That’s the more honest approach… changing it via judicial decision has a number of problems, and perhaps the one that is most evident now is that all it takes to change it back is five Supreme Court justices. That was the method used to swing it one way. How can you complain if the precise method is now used to change it again?

I am pro-choice but I think that Roe v. Wade is a poorly written opinion looking more like “This is what the Constitution should say” rather than a natual reading of unenumerated rights and an extension of Griswold. I was also bothered by how Texas’ claim to have an interest in the life of the fetus was dismissed so readily.

I favor a new challenge to Roe if for no other reason to get a better argument for or against abortion than we currently have.

No, its much more significant than that. It will decide whether the State can decide that a certain abortion proceedure is without medical value, or if that decision has to remain with a woman and her doctor.

Why are pro-life supporters concentrating their efforts on passing a constitutional amendment giving Congress, or the states, the power to regulate abortion, if the judicial process is so fraught with dishonesty, and potential problems?

I just noticed that, rather ironically, the home re-fi add on the page that I linked to, for where it says “click your state”, has a STORK, with the individual feathers representing the states.

Or maybe it was a flamingo…whatever.

Here’s the SD House version of the bill (I couldn’t find the Senate version online).

In addition, in a joint resolution between the SD House and Senate, they both agreed to put forth a state constitutional amendment at the next election. The amendment would be “§ 28. This Constitution shall not be construed to grant any right relating to abortion.”

Interesting. Note how they try to make a “scientific” argument out of what is actually a religious one. And note that they exempt the woman from prosecution. And note that they use “totally unique”-- valley speak has triumphed!

I predict that ten years from now, conservatives are going to wish they had never opening this Pandora’s box. Ever since Roe v Wade, conservatives have been able to have it both ways on abortion - they can throw some red meat to the pro-life voters but without panicking their pro-choice supporters because their hands were tied. Now the ropes are off and they’ll be expected to start delivering laws. And what I expect they’re going to find is that it for every pro-life voter they gain by enacting pro-life legislation they will lose a pro-choice voter. And vice versa if they try to go that route. Conservative legislators are going to find that there are conservative voters who are prepared to vote on the single issue of abortion - and they have opposing views on that issue.

This was completely expected. I’ve expected it since O’Connor announced her retirement, and I’m pretty sure that NARAL is paying at least as much attention as I am.

If this goes to the SCOTUS, it’ll be the most healthy thing we’ve done in years. As I said earlier, there is no way the SCOTUS will uphold this law, but it will require all the justices to go on record as to whether *Roe *deserves to be accorded stare decisis status. No more guessing.