Indiana Supreme Court to determine fate of the state’s GOP-backed abortion ban

19 January 2023

As the 50th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade approaches, Indiana’s Supreme Court is set to hear a case that will determine the fate of the state’s GOP-backed abortion ban, which were enacted last year, The Associated Press reports.

Indiana’s attorney general’s office and attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Indiana, who are representing Planned Parenthood and other advocates challenging the strict ban, will argue the case of whether the ban violates privacy protections under the state’s constitution before the GOP governor-appointed Supreme Court judges.

Just a couple of months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, Indiana was the first state to follow suit and impose a strict abortion ban.

The ban was scheduled to go into effect on September 15, but once Republican County Judge Kelsey Hanlon blocked the new law, abortions could proceed. She stated her reasoning for blocking the ban as “there is reasonable likelihood that this significant restriction of personal autonomy offends the liberty guarantees of the Indiana Constitution,” and according to The Associated Press, “that the clinics could prevail in the legal challenge.”

Although restrictive, AlterNet previously reported that the ban did contain some exceptions. In the case of rape and incest, prior to 10-weeks post-fertilization, or if a fetus is diagnosed with a lethal anomaly, abortions are still permitted.

However, In a court filing, ACLU attorneys wrote that despite the ban’s few exceptions, “myriad logistical hurdles would prevent eligible Hoosiers from obtaining abortions.”

Meanwhile, lawyers from the state attorney general’s office argued Judge Hanlon’s blocking the ban “wrongly created an abortion right.”

They argued, “The judiciary has no power to amend the Constitution by fiat. Reading novel ‘rights’ into the Constitution would set the judiciary on a dangerous, unprincipled path destructive to rule of law.”

In response the ACLU attorneys asserted that they never claimed Indiana “could not regulate abortion at all,” but that doesn’t take away from the fact that the ban infringes on “the core constitutional rights of privacy and bodily autonomy.”

In 2004, an Indiana appeals court decided that “privacy is a core value under the state constitution that extends to all residents, including women seeking an abortion,” according to The Associated Press. Then, the state Supreme Court ruled in favor of a law that enforces an “18-hour waiting period” for women prior to abortion, ignoring the fact that “the state constitution included the right to privacy or abortion.”

There is no deadline for a court ruling in this case.

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