Today, U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson blocked the state of Alabama’s Human Life Protection Act, which sought to ban nearly all abortions in the state. According to a previous article from Live Action News, the law made “abortion and attempted abortion felony offenses in the state” and would “not hold women who have abortions criminally or civilly responsible,” and even had “an exception… to allow abortion ‘to prevent a serious health risk’ to the woman….” Unsurprisingly, there were many myths and inaccuracies surrounding the law, circulated by the abortion industry and its supporters. Read more on what the law, which was set to go into effect November 15, did and didn’t do here.
From the beginning, the law was meant as a challenge to Roe v. Wade, said Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall in a statement, as reported by the Associated Press. “… [W]e intend to submit evidence that supports our argument that Roe and Casey were wrongly decided and that the Constitution does not prohibit states from protecting unborn children from abortion,” he said.
READ: Why has ‘heartbeat’ just become a ‘medically inaccurate’ term? Abortion.
Judge Thompson, in an opinion accompanying his temporary injunction, stated that Alabama’s law “contravenes clear Supreme Court precedent” and “violates the ight of an individual to privacy, to make choices central to personal dignity and autonomy. It diminishes the capacity of women to act in society, and to make reproductive decisions. It defies the United States Constitution,” as reported by the AP.
According to The Blaze, Thompson also claimed, “A near-total ban imposes substantial costs on women, including those who are unable to obtain an abortion and those who ‘desperately seek to exercise their ability to decide whether to have a child’ and thus ‘would take unsafe measures to end their pregnancies.'”
Multiple states have passed similar bans, based on when a preborn child’s heartbeat can be detected. This is typically around six weeks, though the embryonic heart begins to beat between 16 to 21 days after conception. But because of “heartbeat bills,” the abortion industry has been on a mission to claim that “heartbeat” is an inaccurate term used to refer to the cardiac activity of the child in the womb; however, pro-abortion organizations like the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have used the term “heartbeat” for quite some time, and began to back away from its use when states began passing “heartbeat bills.”
Judge Myron Thompson, who issued the ruling in this case, has a history of striking down Alabama’s pro-life provisions. In 2016, Thompson struck down Alabama’s law requiring abortionists to have hospital admitting privileges for patient safety and continuity of care. That same year, he also issued a temporary injunction against the state’s ban on dismemberment D&E abortions. In 2015, Thompson blocked Alabama’s effort to defund Planned Parenthood from the state’s Medicaid program.
Planned Parenthood and the ACLU’s lawsuit will proceed while Thompson’s injunction is in place. Planned Parenthood Southeast CEO Staci Fox told the AP, “This is not only a victory for the people of Alabama — it’s a victory for the entire nation.” ACLU of Alabama executive director Randall Marshall called Alabama’s pro-life law “ill-advised” and said the decision today was not unexpected.
Alabama Governor Kay Ivey said in response to the judge’s decision that the law “passed with overwhelming support” from lawmakers, adding, “We must continue doing all we can to protect life.”
Currently, Alabama has three abortion facilities in operation, according to The Blaze.
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