In South Dakota, Strengthened Legal Efforts to Protect Preborn Children

• By Alan Sears
• Posted Jan 17, 2012
• No Comments »

A federal court has granted the motion of an Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney permitting two South Dakota pregnancy centers to intervene in defense of a new state law – already under attack from Planned Parenthood – that would ensure crucial protections for mothers and their preborn children.

Under that law, no woman could schedule an abortion without obtaining first a screening for coercion by a physician, then an assessment of that coercion and free counseling from a local pregnancy help center. To ensure that each mother has time to think through her decision with all the facts clearly presented, the law further requires a minimum 72-hour waiting period between a doctor’s assessment and the actual abortion procedure.

The law is designed to protect every mother’s fundamental right under the U.S. Constitution to her relationship with her child, says Harold Cassidy, the ADF allied attorney handling this case – and her freedom to embrace that right without the pressures of Planned Parenthood doctors and other abortion providers.

“If Planned Parenthood truly cared about the well-being of women, it would not try to rush them into the abortion chamber before determining that her decision is not being coerced,” Cassidy says. “This law ensures that women have a chance to get accurate information and counseling from those who seek to protect the mother’s true rights. The requirement of a 72-hour waiting period is essential to ensure her decision is voluntary and informed.”

The U.S. District Court for the District of South Dakota, Southern Division, ruled that the two centers, Alpha Center and Black Hills Crisis Pregnancy Center, have a right to intervene in this case, since both “have a significant or legally protectable interest in the legitimacy of the Act because their primary mission of counseling pregnant women, particularly those who are contemplating abortion, would be impeded by striking down the Act.”

Cassidy is also representing the centers in a separate lawsuit, in which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit is reviewing the only remaining provision in South Dakota’s 2005 informed consent law that has not yet been upheld by two other 8th Circuit opinions.

Please be in prayer for Mr. Cassidy, and for all ADF staff and allied attorneys across the U.S. who are working diligently to protect life and families.  Please pray, too, for crisis pregnancy centers nationwide that are doing so much to preserve the lives of preborn children and the health of their mothers.