New Abortion Restrictions in States Are 0 for 8 in Courts

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-20/new-abortion-restrictions-in-states-are-0-for-8-in-courts.html

State legislatures trying to curtail abortions have suffered a 0-for-8 losing streak after court challenges to their new laws this year.

The laws, all but one signed by Republican governors, drew on ideas from a playbook created by an anti-abortion group. Democrats plan to use the attempted curbs to boost 2014 congressional fundraising and increase voter support, calling the laws part of a “War on Women.”

Four states’ statutes attacked the core of the U.S. Supreme Court’s rulings that a woman has a right to the procedure before a fetus is viable. Efforts to bar abortions after six, 12 and 20 weeks of pregnancy were halted in North Dakota, Arkansas and Idaho. An appeals court struck down Arizona’s 20-week ban. Laws imposing restrictions on doctors were blocked in North Dakota and two other states.

Trying to ban abortions before a fetus can live outside the mother’s womb “flies in the face” of U.S. Supreme Court rulings, said Paul B. Linton, a lawyer with the Chicago-based Thomas More Society whose group, an opponent of abortion, isn’t involved in defending early-pregnancy curbs.