ABORTION Supreme Court to decide on notification in emergencies

The court will deliberate on notifying parents for necessary abortions for minors.
LOS ANGELES TIMES
WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court entered the dispute over abortion Monday for the first time in five years by agreeing to decide whether pregnant teenagers facing a health emergency must be permitted to get an abortion without notifying their parents.
Currently, 33 states require doctors to notify a parent before they perform an abortion on a girl younger than 18.
The new case, to be heard in the fall, will not decide whether states may have such laws. Instead, the justices will rule on whether a law requiring parental notification must include an exemption for young women who face a medical emergency.
Two years ago, New Hampshire lawmakers made it illegal for doctors to perform an abortion on a minor until "at least 48 hours after written notice of the pending abortion" was delivered to one of her parents. The law made an exception when the abortion "is necessary to prevent the minor's death."
Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union and the Planned Parenthood Foundation challenged the measure as unconstitutional, because it did not allow doctors to act in the face of a health emergency.
The law as written "forces physicians to delay emergency medical care until a young woman is facing imminent death," said Jennifer Dalven, deputy director of the ACLU's Reproductive Freedom Project.
A federal judge agreed with the challengers and blocked the law from taking effect. In November, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston upheld that decision, saying the law forces physicians "to gamble with their patient's lives ... [or] risk criminal and civil liability."
A surprise decision
New Hampshire Attorney General Kelly Ayotte appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that the law as written should be put into effect. Minors who face a health emergency can ask a judge to waive the notification requirement, she said.
She also urged the Supreme Court to make it harder for judges to strike down laws entirely just because they might cause problems for a few people.
To the surprise of abortion-rights advocates, the Supreme Court voted to hear New Hampshire's appeal in the case of Ayotte vs. Planned Parenthood.
Karen Pearl, president of Planned Parenthood, said she was "surprised and disappointed the Supreme Court has decided to hear this case. Yet we are confident that this court will reaffirm a woman's right to abortion access. States should never put women's health at risk."
In the past, six of the nine justices have supported the right to abortion. However, one of them, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, has voted with the dissenters to uphold stricter regulatory laws on abortion.