Let's goooooooo!
Yep. Arizona's supreme court just ruled that a 160-year-old abortion ban, written before Arizona was even a state, still applies after the overturn of Roe v Wade in the Dobbs decision.
A great day for preborn Arizonans!
The ruling allows an 1864 law in Arizona to stand that criminalized abortion by making it a felony punishable by two to five years in prison for anyone who performs or helps a woman obtain one.
The law — which was codified again in 1901, and once again in 1913, after Arizona became a state — included an exception to save the woman's life.
That's a nearly total ban on physician-performed and prescribed abortions. The only exception being to save the life of the mother, which is rare. In most cases, the safest option for both mother and child is to deliver the baby.
In some situations, such as an ectopic pregnancy where the embryo implants outside the uterus, the child cannot be saved with our current technology.
This ruling may end the abortion industry in Arizona.
The decision — which could shutter abortion clinics in the state — effectively undoes a lower court's ruling that stated that a more recent 15-week ban from March 2022 superseded the 1864 law.
In a 4-2 ruling, the court's majority concluded that the 15-week ban "does not create a right to, or otherwise provide independent statutory authority for, an abortion that repeals or restricts" the Civil War-era ban "but rather is predicated entirely on the existence of a federal constitutional right to an abortion since disclaimed" by the 2022 Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade.
Unfortunately, like all "total abortion bans," this does not prevent women from practicing self-managed abortions, and abortion pills are readily available in the mail.
Arizona has a tough battle ahead: Democrats are making strong efforts to add a constitutional amendment that would allow preborn babies to be killed up until week 24 of gestation.
But for now, it's a good day for life in Arizona.
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