Keep two names in mind as you consider the case the Supreme Court has now decided to take up. One is Kermit Gosnell. The other is Wendy Davis. It was the discovery of Gosnell's abortion butcher factories that prompted the Texas Legislature to pass a law requiring abortion clinics to maintain the same level of safety and quality as every other medical clinic in the state. (I know, they can't ever be safe for the babies.)
And that was the law that led to Davis making herself famous with her marathon performance in Austin vowing to defeat the law on the notion that it essentially outlawed abortion in Texas. Fortunately, this also led to Davis's nomination for governor, which was a complete disaster and helped put Greg Abbott in office. So sometimes it's good when Democrats get what they want.
Anyway, the only way Davis's claim about the law was correct is if Texas abortion clinics are run by a bunch of Gosnell clones and can't possibly pass the inspections. Is that the case? It looked for awhile like we might never find out, because legal challenges prevented the law from being implemented. And while Texas legislators thought they clearly had the authority to pass the law under the 1992 Supreme Court ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the truth is nothing was or is clear about that ruling. Today, though, with Sandra Day O'Connor safely in retirement, the Supremes see the Texas case as a chance to finally get the law right. And they've decided to do it:
Whatever the justices decide next spring will help clarify the court's 1992 ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, when a deeply divided court upheld the right to abortion while letting states impose restrictions that do not block women from obtaining services.
"This will be the most important abortion rights case before the Supreme Court in almost 25 years," said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of several abortion clinics.
"It's overdue," said Steven Aden, senior counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom, which has submitted briefs on behalf of several states in the legal battle. “The Casey standard is unworkable and was ill-designed to begin with. We have more litigation now over the meaning of the Casey standard than we’ve ever had."
By clearing up the ambiguity left by the 1992 ruling, which said states can impose restrictions that do not constitute an "undue burden," the justices could serve notice to lower courts across the country and hand a victory to one side or the other in a debate that has raged since their Roe v. Wade decision legalized abortion in 1973.
Liberal opposition to this law really exposes the pro-abortion movement for what it is. It is certainly not about the health of women, because if that were the case, you'd think these people would be the first to want the clinics operating according to the highest safety and health standards. They don't. And keep in mind that these are people who usually think stringent government regulation is the answer to everything. When it comes to abortion they've suddenly turned into limited-government free-marketeers because they recognize that most of their beloved clinics would never pass the safety inspection.
If the result of that is that many miles of Texas would go unserviced by any abortion clinic, that's the fault of the clinic operators themselves for running the clinics in the finest tradition of Kermit Gosnell, but Wendy Davis and her allies don't care. As long as those babies die, that's all that matters - and a horribly confusing Supreme Court decision from 23 years ago is at least for the moment helping to make that possible.
Hopefully this time the Supremes take their job more seriously - all nine of them. Or at least five.
