South Dakota voters on Tuesday decisively rejected the toughest abortion ban in the nation, repealing a law that subjected doctors to five years in prison if they terminated a pregnancy for any reason except to prevent the woman's death.The authentic, Orthdox Jewish position on abortion is far more lenient than the Christian view. South Dakota's "no exception" law was a direct affront to Jewish law, which allows rape, incest and mental health exceptions. Rabbi Eliezar Yehuda Waldenberg even allows abortion exceptions for fetus that might be born with a deformity (up to the third month) and for fetuses carrying a lethal disease (up to the seventh month.) Other poskim even permit abortion when there are financial or family stress issues. Under the South Dakota law all of that would have been outlawed.
The fact that the voters of South Dakota defeated a law that would have prevented Jews from performing a permitted, and sometimes necessary, act is cause for celebration.
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