Oklahoma Supreme Court Strikes Down Statistical Reporting of Abortions Act as Unconstitutional
by Robin Marty, RH Reality Check
February 19, 2010 - 3:12pm (Print)
The Oklahoma Supreme Court has ruled the Statistical Reporting of Abortions Act unconstitutional, ending a three-month battle to enact the controversial anti-choice legislation. Passed by the Oklahoma legislature in October of 2009, the law would require women seeking an abortion to answer nearly 40 different questions regarding her reasons for doing so, including invasive and personal questions that could be used to disclose a woman's personal identity.
The law, which would have gone into effect on November 1, 2009 instead was put under a temporary restraining order while lawyers debated whether or not it was constitutional. The Oklahoma constitution does not allow laws to address multiple subjects in one law, and the law in question combined four different anti-choice pieces of legislation, including a ban on sex-selective abortions.
“We are very pleased with today’s ruling,” said Jennifer Mondino, staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights. “The government has no business running a grand inquisition into the private lives of Oklahoma women and wasting a quarter of a million dollars of tax payers’ money in the process.”
Anti-choice legislators have prepared for the possibility of the ruling, stating that they already have drafted single subject bills for each initiative addressed in the struck down law.
“We are very pleased with today’s ruling,” said Jennifer Mondino, staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights. “The government has no business running a grand inquisition into the private lives of Oklahoma women and wasting a quarter of a million dollars of tax payers’ money in the process.”
The Court did NOT say the government has no business running an inquisition but rather that the government can't use this law to do so because this law addressed multiple subjects. It will be very interesting to see what the Court has to say about inquisitions if a single law concerning only that subject is passed. My guess, since this is Oklahoma, is that it'll think an inquisition is just fine so long as it only affects women.
If the legislature really, truly wanted to find out the information included in this survey, they could have funded a scientific study which respected the privacy of the women involved for a lot less money than they've already spent.
http://www.theonion.com/content/video/new_law_requires_women_to_name
Trust me...The Onion never disappoints.
