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Monday, March 06, 2006

Abortion outlawed in South Dakota

Report:
Gov. Mike Rounds signed legislation Monday banning nearly all abortions in South Dakota, setting up a court fight aimed at challenging the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion... The bill would make it a crime for doctors to perform an abortion unless the procedure was necessary to save the woman’s life. It would make no exception for cases of rape or incest.
Also introduced was a new state logo.

It ought to be pointed out that South Dakota's "no exception" law is 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.)

If this law carries (which it won't. Federal courts will uphold the Roe precedent, as, I suspect, will the Supreme Court, as currently constitututed) wouldn't you love to see some pious, God-fearing Jew turn the conventional wisdom on its ear by appearing in a South Dakota court to argue that the "no exception" abortion law interferes with his religious rights?

I sure would.