More from the Kansas City Star:

The 77-48 vote Friday on the measure, which started out dealing with reporting abortion statistics, returns the bill the Senate to consider the House changes.

When the bill was debated Thursday, Rep. Jan Pauls amended it to say any discussion about abortion must include a description of all methods of abortion, including what state law calls partial birth abortion. The information must include “the probable physical sensations of pain a fetus feels or detects” during the various procedures.

The bill also says that when schools offer pregnancy-related instruction, it should include information about fetal development and gestation, including pictures or drawings of the fetus at four-week increments from fertilization to full term.

“It’s important that when children are being taught sex ed, they be aware of what the fetus looks like,” said Pauls, D-Hutchinson.

Pauls said she didn’t consider the measure an anti-abortion bill.

“If a girl might choose an abortion at some point, they would be informed,” she said. “For me, it’s just a disclosure. Students need to know what fetuses look like and the methods of abortion.”

The bill also says the method of implementing the requirements should be left to the schools and that parents or guardians can refuse to have their child attend such instruction.

The original intent of the bill was to generate more information about abortions performed after the 22nd week of pregnancy, including details about the specific fetal anomalies, although abortion rights supporters say the true goal is to burden doctors and clinics.

Kansas Department of Health and Environment statistics show the number of reported abortions decreased from 12,327 in 2000 to 10,542 last year.

Kathy Ostrowski, a Kansans for Life lobbyist, said the bill will result in additional information about abortions so that Kansans know whether the law is being followed.

She and her fellow anti-abortion activists believe clinics violate openly violate restrictions, particularly on late-term procedures.

But the clinics have said repeatedly that they comply with Kansas law.

And Sen. David Haley, D-Kansas City, an abortion rights supporter, said the bill is vague about when additional information is required.

“This ambiguity would allow a zealous prosecutor or a zealous attorney general or the like to conduct further fishing expeditions,” Haley said.

Haley and other abortion rights activists also criticized the requirement that human sexuality courses discuss abortion methods.

“Those are not things that most parents are going to want their 12- or 13-year-old kid to know about,” Rep. Paul Davis, D-Lawrence.

But Ostrowski said girls as young as 13 and 14 regularly receive health services because they’re sexually active.

“They should know what the facts are of the pregnancy, rather than have the girl discover a few years later,” she said.

More via Boise’s KBCI:

The Senate State Affairs Committee voted unanimously Friday to send the amended informed consent bill to the floor for debate.

The changes are meant to allow doctors to skirt the waiting period and information requirements in the case of medical emergencies.

That exception was missing from the original law, which the Idaho Attorney General says is likely unconstitutional.

Deputy Attorney General William von Tagen signed off on the proposed changes, saying they’d likely pass judicial scrutiny.

Anti-abortion advocacy groups praised the measure, sponsored by Sen. Hal Bunderson, (R) Meridian.

Barbara Gough with Generation Life told senate committee members that when she had an abortion at age 17 in 1985, not much information was made available to her.

“They just highlighted the surgery procedure,” Gough told Local 2 News. “There was no information on alternatives to abortion, emotional effects, it was all very superficial. Basically it left me in the dark.”

Meanwhile, abortion rights advocates said the package shores up laws that interfere with access to abortions and encroaches on the doctor-patient relationship.

“This bill forces health care professionals to provide women with information that is intended to discourage them from having abortions,” said Marty Durand with ACLU of Idaho.

In a related development, a proposed new law requiring minor girls to get their parents’ consent before having an abortion has stalled and may not get a hearing this year.

The Idaho attorney general has concerns about its constitutionality.

Idaho has spent $360,000 dollars since 2000 fighting separate abortion-related litigation, including a 2005 parental-consent law that’s on appeal in the U-S 9th Circuit.

That has state lawmakers leery about passing another law that’ll just cost the state more money in legal fees.

According to a March 28 opinion from the state’s top law enforcement agency, provisions of Representative Bill Sali’s bill for a girl to bypass her parents’ permission by going through a judge still face legitimate challenges in court.

The Kuna Republican, who is running for Congress, said he wasn’t certain if he’d be able to resurrect the measure this year.

He says “the bar has been set pretty high.”

The Columbus Ledger-Inquirer has more:

A third bill would create a murder charge any time a fetus is destroyed in an attack on a pregnant woman.

The Unborn Victims of Violence Act expands Georgia’s current law, which says a fetus must have a chance to stay alive outside the womb for its destruction to be considered a murder. The new bill would call for a murder charge at any point in the pregnancy.

Sen. Renee Unterman, R-Buford, said the bill is similar to federal law passed in the wake of the highly publicized 2002 death of Laci Peterson, whose husband was convicted of murdering both her and their unborn son.

“If both of them are killed, then you’re actually killing two people - the mother and the baby,” Unterman said.

That measure passed on a 37-15 vote, with some critics arguing the bill was an abortion-related effort to expand legal protection of fetuses.

“It’s ironic that what you say does not mirror what you do,” said Sen. Regina Thomas, D-Savannah.

The pharmacist bill would allow any pharmacist who files an objection to abortions in writing to refuse to fill a prescription for a drug that terminates pregnancy.

The bill’s scope is limited, since drugs like RU-486 - which induces abortions - may only be handed out by doctors. It would not impact emergency contraceptives, such as the so-called “morning after pill.”

The bill, by Sen. Jim Whitehead, R-Evans, passed 35-15, after senators voted down an amendment by Sen. Steen Miles, D-Decatur, that would have given pharmacists a similar exemption if they object to giving out “sexually enhancing drugs” like Viagra.

A third bill, by Sen. Nancy Schaefer, R-Turnerville, would require doctor who perform abortions to make a sonogram image of the fetus and offer to show the image to the woman seeking the procedure.

Schaefer said she thinks many women who see the sonogram will reconsider their decision to have abortions.

“This sonogram will save lives,” she said of the plan, which passed 35-17.

Senate Democrats, even those who supported some of the measures, complained about the priorities of majority Republicans in the chamber.

“We need to focus on what’s important,” said Sen. George Hooks, D-Americus. “Kids who live on dirt roads can’t get to school when it rains, we’re rock-bottom in the nation in education and we’re up here hollering about abortion.”

Tags: Abortion,, Georgia,, Georgia, Senate,, Pro-Choice,, Pro-Life,, Anti-Abortion,, Abortion, Legislation,, Abortion, photos,, Abortion, pill,, Morning, After, Pill

KMBC Kansas City has more:

Blunt said he feared an abortion ban could lock the state in a legal battle, which Missouri Right to Life said may not yet be winnable.

Their comments came a day after Sen. Jason Crowell introduced a pair of ballot measures asking voters to prohibit abortions except to save the life of a woman.

Blunt, who has supported other efforts to restrict abortions, told reporters: “I’m not convinced it’s necessary” to pass a general abortion ban.

“I think we need to really focus on the legislation that will reduce the number of abortions in our state — not just set up court battles,” Blunt said.

Crowell has said he hopes his measure — if passed by lawmakers and voters — would result in a legal challenge that reaches the U.S. Supreme Court.

A similar abortion ban recently passed the South Dakota legislature, and Republican Gov. Mike Rounds has said he is inclined to sign it. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, a Republican, also said he probably would sign an abortion ban bill under consideration in the state House.

Crowell’s pair of proposals — one a constitutional amendment, the other a change in law — would go directly to Missouri’s ballot if passed by the Legislature, without need of the governor’s signature.

“I just consider myself a pro-life legislator … and ending abortions is the most pro-life anyone can be,” Crowell said Thursday. “I think the time is now to end abortions in the state of Missouri.”

But not everyone in Missouri’s anti-abortion movement, which historically has received strong bipartisan support in the Legislature, agrees.

“We’re obviously in favor of a ban on abortion; that is our ultimate goal. But we are concerned about the timing,” said Patty Skain, executive director of Missouri Right to Life.

Skain said she fears there aren’t enough votes on the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling establishing a right to abortion. If an appeal of a state abortion ban reaches the court too soon, it could backfire by resulting in a ruling that reaffirms abortion rights, she said.

Alison Gee, political director for Planned Parenthood in St. Louis, said Crowell is seeking to impose extreme limitations.

“His proposals would also not take into account at all the health and safety of women,” she said. “The really unconscionable piece about all this is this is the same body trying to make it harder for women to access legal contraception.”

Crowell also is the sponsor of legislation that would prohibit pharmacies from disciplining employees who refuse to fill prescriptions to which they have objections, such as Plan B emergency contraception, also known as the morning-after pill.

Crowell’s abortion legislation would make it a felony to perform an abortion when not saving a women’s life, punishable by a prison sentence of five to 15 years.

When asked about Crowell’s bill, Blunt noted that Missouri law already states that life begins at conception.

“I’m not convinced anything is necessary to add to that,” the governor said.

Tags: Abortion,, Missouri,, Roy, Blunt,, Missouri, Right, To, Live,, Missouri, Abortion,, Pro, Choice

Jurist has more.

The Missouri Supreme Court has upheld the state’s 24-hour waiting period for abortions, a decision that turns the focus of the legal battle to federal court.

AP has more:

The unanimous ruling Tuesday by Missouri’s highest court focused on whether the 2003 law ran contrary to the state constitution. The judges rejected arguments that it was overly vague and deprived people of liberty and privacy rights.

“It’s a victory for the women of Missouri who find themselves in a crisis pregnancy but need the information and time to consider what’s best for them,” said Patty Skain, executive director of Missouri Right to Life.

Although considered a victory for anti-abortion groups, the ruling may not be the end of the matter. That’s because Planned Parenthood affiliates, which filed the state case, also have challenged the law in federal court.

Last year, a federal judge allowed the 24-hour wait to take effect but issued a preliminary injunction against the law’s language describing what physicians must discuss with patients. That injunction is to expire 10 days after the state Supreme Court decision is made final.

Planned Parenthood officials plan to decide soon whether to continue pursuing the federal case, said Peter Brownlie, president of Planned Parenthood for Kansas and Mid-Missouri.

The Missouri law requires physicians to wait 24 hours after conferring with women before performing abortions. It requires that consultation to cover such things as the “physical, psychological and situational” risk factors associated with abortions.

Twenty-four states require women to wait a specified amount of time _ most often 24 hours _ between counseling and the abortion procedure, according to The Alan Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit group that researches reproductive health issues.

Planned Parenthood claims the consultation requirements are so vague they place physicians under the threat of prosecution for something they may not understand.

But the Missouri Supreme Court said that the law places no further duty on abortion physicians than they already have under common law, and that the 24-hour waiting provision did not violate the state constitution.

“There is no reason to construe the language in the Missouri constitution more broadly than the corresponding language of the federal Constitution, and the United States Supreme Court already has determined that such a waiting provision does not violate the federal Constitution,” the court wrote.

Violators of Missouri’s abortion consent law can face the loss of their medical licenses and misdemeanor charges punishable by up to one year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

The ruling is the latest blow to abortion rights supporters.

A Mississippi House committee voted Tuesday to ban most abortions in the state. The only abortions allowed under the bill would be if the life of the pregnant woman were in danger.

It’s similar to a bill that South Dakota lawmakers passed last week that would make it a crime for doctors to perform abortions in the state except to save a pregnant woman’s life. The bill went to Republican Gov. Mike Rounds on Tuesday, and he has 15 days to act. Rounds has said he’s inclined to sign the bill into law.

And in Kentucky, legislation requiring women to receive face-to-face counseling before undergoing abortions was passed by the Senate on Tuesday, an effort to end the practice of some clinics to use recorded messages over the telephone.

The Des Moines Register has more:

“I like to suggest life is the best choice — probably not the only choice but the best choice,” Vilsack, a possible candidate for president in town for the National Governors Association winter meeting, said in response to a question at the event.

He said that in Iowa, he has worked to expand opportunities for adoption and improve pre-natal care and access to preschool, and the number of abortions is on the decline.

Nonetheless, “I obviously do not agree with the approach South Dakota” has taken, Vilsack said.

Opinion: Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, Inc., et al.

Arguments: Scheidler, Joseph, et al. v. National Organization for Women, Inc., et al. (PDF)

Scheidler v. National Organization for Women (2003 Arguments and Opinion)

The U.S. Supreme Court this in Schiedler vs. National Organization for Women, et al, week ruled that abortion clinics cannot use federal laws against racketerring and extortion to stop demonstrations.
The New York Times has more:

The opinion by Justice Stephen G. Breyer turned on two words. The justices ruled that clinics could not use the decades-old Hobbs Act, which outlaws the obstruction of commerce by “robbery or extortion,” to stymie protesters.

“Physical violence unrelated to robbery or extortion falls outside the Hobbs Act’s scope,” Justice Breyer wrote. To try to use the act as the National Organization for Women and other abortion-rights advocates have done “broadens the Hobbs Act’s scope well beyond what case law has assumed,” he wrote.

Moreover, the ruling noted, Congress specifically addressed the needs of abortion clinics and their patients in 1994, when it passed legislation that makes it a federal crime to attack or blockade abortion clinics, their operators or their patrons. By its actions in 1994, Congress suggested that the much older Hobbs act did not address anti-abortion protests, Justice Breyer wrote.

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. did not take part in today’s ruling. He took his seat on the court after the case, Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, No. 04-1244, was argued last Nov. 30.

The ruling today marked the third time the justices have addressed the long-running dispute over how federal law applies to blockades of abortion clinics. The Hobbs Act, enacted in 1946 to supersede a 1934 anti-racketeering statute, specifically outlaws the obstruction of commerce “by robbery or extortion.”

Two violations of the Hobbs Act, in turn, can demonstrate a “pattern of racketeering activity” that entitles victims to triple damages under the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO.

In the 1980’s, the National Organization for Women and two abortion clinics sued Operation Rescue and the Pro-Life Action League under the Hobbs Act. In 1994, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that abortion clinics could use that statute, but that they had to prove in court that the actions of protesters were part of a “pattern of racketeering activity.”

But later, after the anti-abortion groups won in the lower federal courts, the Supreme Court reversed its own ruling, holding in 2003 that the protesters’ behavior around clinics did not amount to extortion, or trying to obtain another’s property through real or threatened “force, violence or fear.”

The justices found in the 2003 ruling that the 117 specific acts described in the lawsuit did not meet that definition, and they sent the case back to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. But instead of dismissing the suit, the Seventh Circuit kept it alive on the basis of four additional actions of protest that the Supreme Court had not reviewed, and it ordered the Federal District Court in Chicago to determine whether those four actions might fall under the Hobbs Act.

In their latest appeal to the Supreme Court, Joseph Scheidler, the national director of the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League, and his allies argued that the Seventh Circuit had misread the 2003 Supreme Court ruling and ought to have dismissed the entire lawsuit.

“I am mystified that I had to go to the trouble and expense of appearing before the Supreme Court three times,” Mr. Scheidler said today, in a statement issued in Chicago. He said NOW had refused to acknowledge defeat and had persuaded the Seventh Circuit to keep the case alive “in spite of the Supreme Court’s clear mandate to end it” in 2003.

Mr. Scheidler’s lawyer, Thomas Brejcha, called today’s ruling “not just a victory for pro-life activists, but for anyone who chooses to exercise his First Amendment rights to effect social change.”

demonstrations against abortions.

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Opinion: Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, Inc., et al.Arguments: Scheidler, Joseph, et al. v. National Organization for Women, Inc., et al. (PDF)Scheidler v. National Organization for Women (2003 Arguments and Opinion)

The opinion by Justice Stephen G. Breyer turned on two words. The justices ruled that clinics could not use the decades-old Hobbs Act, which outlaws the obstruction of commerce by “robbery or extortion,” to stymie protesters.

“Physical violence unrelated to

KELO-TV has more:

It’s the state’s second largest industry, but South Dakota tourism could see a drop in visitors who don’t support a ban on abortion.

Annie Laurie Gaylor of the Women’s Medical Fund says, “Women across the country and those who believe in women’s rights need to act immediately to let South Dakotans know that we will bypass South Dakota, that we can do without Mount Rushmore, the Black Hills and the Badlands and the Corn Palace.”

Last year tourism brought in two billion dollars worth of economic impact.

Teri Ellis Schmidt with the SF Convention and Visitors Bureau says, “Tourism is critical to Sioux Falls and all of South Dakota. It’s the bread and butter of a lot of people’s livelihoods.”

And while out-of-state visitors may not think of places like the falls, they often stop here on their way out west. So this part of the state could also take a hit.

Schmidt says, “We know Sioux Falls is also a destination spot for tourists and convention goers and they may stay longer and go to the Black Hills so what’s good for one of us is good for all and what’s bad for one is bad for all of us.”

And since some potential visitors believe the abortion bill is bad for America, they plan to take their anger out on the state where they believe it will hurt the most.

Gaylor says, “They depend on tourism and the goodwill of other Americans./30:28 “when Idaho was poised to pass a similar ban there was a boycott called of Idaho potatoes and we got the governor to back down.”

But Governor Mike Rounds has also heavily promoted increasing tourism as part of his 20-10 initiative, which increases the political pressure as he decides whether to sign the controversial bill into law.

Schmidt says, “I wouldn’t want to be in the governor’s shoes for anything right now!”

The state tourism office has received between 60 and 75 emails on the issue, both positive and negative.

MILive has more:

“I am asking the federal appellate court to uphold the will of the people,” the Republican said of the law approved by the Legislature in 2004.

In September, U.S. District Court Judge Denise Page Hood in Detroit ruled the Legal Birth Definition Act placed an “undue burden” on women’s right to choose. Hood said the law was confusing and vague and its exceptions for the health or life of a mother were meaningless and unconstitutional.

Proponents of the law said they were attempting to ban a procedure they call “partial-birth” abortion, but critics said it banned all abortions. Previous attempts by state lawmakers to stop the abortion procedure were struck down by federal courts in 1997 and 2001.

In his brief before the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Cox points to a January ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, which said that lower courts in addressing flaws in abortion laws do not have to strike down an entire law. Instead, the justices said that other “modest” options are available.

Cox argues the Michigan law only bans the abortion procedure doctors label “intact dilation and extraction,” or D&X, and not other procedures that are constitutionally protected. The law can be construed to adequately protect a woman’s life and health, Cox says.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan, Center for Reproductive Rights and Planned Parenthood Federation of America, who sued to block the law, have argued it is too broad.

The case is Northland Family Planning v. Cox.