Federal Appeals Court Hears Arguments In Case Challenging Michigan's Ban On Certain Late-Term Abortions

A three-judge panel of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati on Thursday heard arguments in an appeal of a lower court's ruling that declared unconstitutional a Michigan law that would have banned so-called "partial-birth" abortions, the AP/Detroit Free Press reports (Kinney, AP/Detroit Free Press, 10/26). The American Civil Liberties Union, the Center for Reproductive Rights and the Planned Parenthood Federation of America in March 2005 filed suit in federal court to prevent enforcement of the state law, known as the Legal Birth Definition Act, which would have changed the legal definition of birth to the first moment any part of a fetus is outside a woman's body. The measure, which became law in June 2004, was scheduled to take effect on March 30, 2005, but U.S. District Judge Denise Page Hood approved a temporary restraining order preventing it from being enforced. Hood in her ruling called the law confusing and vague and said its exceptions for the health or life of a mother are irrelevant and unconstitutional. "The act does not describe any specific procedure to be banned," Hood wrote in her opinion. Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox (R) in February filed a brief with the appellate court, which stated that a January U.S. Supreme Court ruling said that lower courts are not required to strike down an entire law when ruling on abortion-related issues. Cox said that more "modest" solutions are possible (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 3/1).

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