Advocates International moves to intervene in federal conscience case on behalf of Concerned Women for America and four pro-life medical asociations

Yesterday, attorneys for Advocates International moved to intervene in the federal lawsuit challenging the conscience regulation on behalf of the women's advocacy group Concerned Women for America as well as four pro-life medical associations, Christian Pharmacists Fellowship International, Care Net, Heartbeat International and the New Jersey Physicians Resource Council.

Read their press release and the motion to intervene and the supporting brief.

As discussed earlier, Center and ADF attorneys represent the first group of proposed intervenors Catholic Medical Association, Christian Medical Association, and the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

CLS Center and ADF attorneys move to intervene in conscience regulation lawsuit on behalf of pro-life medical associations

On behalf of pro-life professional medical associations, attorneys for the CLS Center for Law & Religious Freedom and the Alliance Defense Fund have filed motions to intervene in three lawsuits challenging a regulation that protects the medical professional right of conscience. View the press release here.

Last week, Planned Parenthood, a group of states including Connecticut, and the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association (NFPRHA) represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) brought lawsuits seeking to invalidate a Health & Human Services regulation that protects doctors and other medical professionals from being forced to participate in abortions against their consciences.

CLS and ADF attorneys represent the Catholic Medical Association, the Christian Medical Association, and the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

The complaints, briefs in support of motion for intervention, and the proposed answers for the respective cases are available from the CLS Center:

Connecticut v. United States

NFPRHA v. Leavitt

Planned Parenthood v. Leavitt

The Center previously submitted comments on behalf of the Christian Legal Society and the Fellowship of Christian Physician Assistants in support of the enactment of this rule.

CLS and ADF attorneys also successfully defended against two challenges to the Weldon Amendment, which is one the three underlying statutes implemented by the regulation; that is, California v. United States (press release), and National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association v. Gonzales (press release).

Abortion Advocates Challenge Conscience Protection

According to the Washington Post, abortion advocates have filed three lawsuits challenging the newly final HHS rule protecting the consciences of health care providers.

From the Presidential Debates: the "Health of the Mother" Canard Demonstrated.

In last night's presidential debate, Senator John McCain criticized Barack Obama for his opposition to proscriptions on abortion, including partial birth abortion. Obama countered that he had only opposed a Partial Birth Abortion Ban because it did not include an exception for cases where it was necessary to protect the "health of the mother."

Planned Parenthood has argued strenuously that the partial birth abortion procedure -- in which a child is pulled up to halfway outside the birth canal before its skull is crushed, it's brains sucked out, and it is delivered dead -- is necessary to protect a woman's health. In Gonzales v. Carhart the Supreme Court turned away a facial challenge to the law, holding that this procedure was unnecessary to protect a woman's health, deferring to Congress's finding after extensive hearings that the procedure was never necessary to protect a woman's health. However, the Court left open the possibility of as-applied challenges to the PBA ban if a woman's health was ever threatened by the unavailability of the procedure. Justice Ginsburg invited and predicted such challenges.

But after 18 months no such challenge has been brought. 547 days have now passed after the Supreme Court's decision upholding the PBA Ban and permitting it to go into effect. By Planned Parenthood's estimates, likely very low, six partial birth abortions were occurring daily prior to this decision. By these figures, 3,282 partial birth abortions have NOT occurred since the Supreme Court allowed the statute to go into effect without a health exception. Yet, not a single as-applied challenge has been brought claiming that the PBA Ban endangered a woman's health in a specific case.

I have discussed this point previously here and here. Again, either women have experienced a remarkable streak of luck in the past 18 months, the abortion advocacy groups are terribly understaffed in their legal departments, or Planned Parenthood and others were lying about the medical necessity of partial birth abortion. But in any case, someone now arguing for such an exception should bear the burden to demonstrate why the lack of a health exception for partial birth abortions has been a burden on women for the past 18 months.

So, I ask again. Was Planned Parenthood Lying?

Or perhaps they're just understaffed?

One year ago last Friday, on April 18, 2007, the Supreme Court rejected facial challenges to the constitutionality of the federal Partial Birth Abortion Ban. Before and after the Court's ruling in Gonzalez v. Carhart, Planned Parenthood attorneys had warned that permitting the ban on partial birth abortions to go into effect would threaten women's health. Expressing the same concerns, Justice Ginsburg predicted and invited as-applied challenges to the PBA ban to protect womens' health.

Ninety-seven days after the decision I noted here that it was odd then that Planned Parenthood had not brought such an as-applied challenge. After all, according to Planned Parenthood, 6 partial birth abortions were occurring per day. Assuming the truth of this figure - and it was likely a gross understatement - there have now been 2232 partial birth abortions that have NOT happened as a result of the Court's decision last April. Ed Whalen also notes that the attempted explanations for Planned Parenthood's failure to bring an as applied challenge on behalf of one of these thousands of women no longer hold water (and never did).

So, I ask again. Is it possible that Planned Parenthood wasn't being entirely truthful when it told the Court that partial birth abortion was necessary to protect womens' health? Or have we just witnessed 372 remarkably lucky days?