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Appeals court hears case considered a first in abortion litigation

A case that is being called a first in the history of abortion litigation in the United States is being heard by the eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis, Missouri Wednesday. The case involves Planned Parenthood's challenge of an informed-consent measure passed by the 2005 South Dakota Legislature, requiring that doctors inform women prior to an abortion that the procedure ends a human life.



South Dakota passed the "Women's Right To Know" law in 2005, requiring doctors who perform abortions to make a disclosure in writing to the woman that the abortion will "terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being." Subsequently, Planned Parenthood's Sioux Falls clinic was taken to court and accused of violating that law.

A three-judge panel of the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled in favor of Planned Parenthood last fall. But now the entire court will hear oral arguments. Attorney Harold Cassidy, who is presenting the arguments on behalf of South Dakota, says this case breaks new ground.

"The courts have never determined one way or the other whether an abortion terminates the life of a human being; they've been totally silent on this," Cassidy explains. "So this particular case requires a determination of whether that's an accurate statement," he says. "Planned Parenthood claims it's nothing but ideology."

On the other hand, Cassidy notes, the state and the interveners his firm represents, the pregnancy help centers, contend that saying abortion terminates the life of a human being is "an accurate, clearly truthful statement of scientific fact."