{"id":20609,"date":"2020-07-02T08:46:45","date_gmt":"2020-07-02T13:46:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/?p=20609"},"modified":"2020-07-02T08:46:49","modified_gmt":"2020-07-02T13:46:49","slug":"the-justices-dissent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ifamnews.com\/en\/the-justices-dissent","title":{"rendered":"The Justices Dissent"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

[This article originally appeared in SALVO (www.salvomag.com<\/a>) on June 30, 2020; it is reproduced here with permission. \u2013 Ed.]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Monday of this week, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down yet another state attempt at regulating the abortion industry\u2014this time, in Louisiana.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The case, June Medical Services LLC v. Russo<\/em>, dealt with a Louisiana state law requiring that abortion providers have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. The court determined that the case was in every respect almost identical to the 2016 Whole Woman\u2019s Health v. Hellerstedt<\/em>, a 2016 decision striking down a Texas law requiring admitting privileges, and thus required the same answer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dissenting Justices\u2014Thomas, Alito, Gursuch, and Kavanaugh\u2014all pointed out some similar problems with this decision. First, as Justice Thomas strongly argues, the abortionists who brought this case before the Supreme Court had no right to do so\u2014and thus this case should never have been heard. At issue here is the idea of \u201cthird-party standing,\u201d the idea that a third party (in this case, abortion providers) can argue on behalf of others. As Roberts argues, \u201c[The abortionists\u2019] sole claim before this Court is that Louisiana\u2019s law violates the purported substantive due process right of a woman to abort her unborn child. But they concede that this right does not belong to them, and they seek to vindicate no private rights of their own.\u201d Or, as Justice Alito puts it, \u201cthe idea that a regulated party can invoke the right of a third party for the purpose of attacking legislation enacted to protect the third party is stunning.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But also at issue here is the dubious and contested term, \u201cwomen\u2019s health.\u201d One line of argument used in this case and others is that admitting privileges are simply not necessary to maintain proper healthcare standards. This, the dissenting justices argue, is untrue in a number of ways. Boards granting admitting privileges take a long, hard look at doctors\u2019 performance. As Justice Alito writes, \u201cThe record shows that the vetting conducted by hospitals goes far beyond what is done at Louisiana abortion clinics.\u201d Take, for example, June Medical, the facility that brought the original suit. June Medical requires nothing more than the possession of a medical license to perform an abortion, and Alito writes that \u201cDoe 3, the only person at that clinic who evaluates applicants, testified that he does not perform background checks of any kind, not even criminal records checks.\u201d The clinic has previously even hired an ophthalmologist and radiologist to perform abortions. Other abortion facilities in the state had similar lax procedures for examining practitioners\u2019 backgrounds before hiring, leading Alito to conclude that it is not surprising that the Louisiana Department of Health had issued \u201cStatements of Deficiency\u201d against these abortion facilities for failing to establish proper credentialing procedures, and failing to adequately examine physicians\u2019 backgrounds or possible claims of malpractice against them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Justice Gorsuch offered similar, compelling reasons for the admitting privileges requirement. Gorsuch summarizes testimony to the inherent risk of abortion procedures, including perforated uterus, hemorrhage, cervical laceration, left-behind fetal body parts, and more. These risks, he continues, are minimized when the doctors performing the abortion are \u201ccompetent.\u201d But \u201cLouisiana\u2019s abortion clinics historically have done little to ensure provider competence.\u201d The Court also heard testimony as to some of the ways that Louisiana\u2019s abortion facilities have done anything but maintain environments and standards to safeguard women\u2019s health, including the failure to maintain sterile environments and failure to check patients\u2019 vital signs. \u201cOne clinic,\u201d Gorsuch writes, \u201cused single-use hoses and tubes on multiple patients, and the solution needed to sterilize instruments was changed so infrequently that it often had pieces of tissue floating in it. Hospital credentialing processes, witnesses suggested, could help prevent such violations.\u201d Gorsuch also related witness testimony, including that of one woman who, when hemorrhaging, was told by her abortionist \u201cYou\u2019re on your own. Get out.\u201d The woman later visited an emergency room, where a physician removed fetal body parts that the abortionist had missed. Another woman, complaining of severe pain following her abortion, was told to go home and lie down. She visited an ER instead, where the physicians found a large hematoma containing a fetal head. These are but two of a long list of horror stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the abortion providers of June Medical Services brought this suit against Louisiana, they were not concerned for the health of their patients. If they were, they may have attempted, instead, to first try to curb some of the incidents that brought about numerous citations.  They could have also sought to fulfill the law\u2019s requirements. But instead, \u201cas the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit found, Louisiana\u2019s abortion doctors did not bother to make a good-faith attempt to obtain admitting privileges. Instead, they \u2018largely sat on their hands,\u2019<\/a> not even trying to see if they could satisfy the law\u2019s requirements for their patients\u2019 wellbeing.\u201d[1]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One might suggest that it was the state of Louisiana, and not the Supreme Court or the abortionists, who had the interests of women at heart. It was the state that was best positioned to understand the infractions of the handful of clinics in its borders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What worried these doctors was not the health of their patients, but rather the ways in which this state requirement would hinder their well-oiled money-making machine. Women\u2019s health was the last thing on their mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

[1]<\/a> Denise Harle, \u201cSymposium: A long-awaited opportunity to close the loophole on third-party standing,\u201d SCOTUS blog (January 29, 2020), available at https:\/\/scotusblog.com\/2020\/01\/symposium-a-long-awaited-opportunity-to-close-the-loophole-on-third-party-standing\/.
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SCOTUS Strikes Down Yet Another Attempt Towards Abortion Regulation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":20620,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"mc4wp_mailchimp_campaign":[],"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"subtitle":"SCOTUS Strikes Down Yet Another Attempt Towards Abortion Regulation","format":"standard","video":"","gallery":"","source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override":[{"single_blog_custom":"","sidebar":"","second_sidebar":"","share_position":"","share_float_style":"","post_date_format":"","post_date_format_custom":"","post_reading_time_wpm":"","zoom_button_out_step":"1","zoom_button_in_step":"1","number_popup_post":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"","single_post_gallery_size":""}],"trending_post_position":"","trending_post_label":""},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":""},"jnews_social_meta":{"fb_title":"","fb_description":"","fb_image":"","twitter_title":"","twitter_description":"","twitter_image":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[804,805,808],"tags":[475,641],"class_list":["post-20609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking-news","category-foreground","category-life","tag-abortion","tag-supreme-court"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Justices Dissent - 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