A 27-year-old woman from southern Arkansas waited nervously at the Hope Medical ...
SHREVEPORT, La. - A 27-year-old woman from southern Arkansas waited nervously at the Hope Medical Group for Women after traveling two hours for a medical procedure that is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain in certain parts of the United States: an abortion.
Its fate lies in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court, which on March 4 is set to hear the clinic’s challenge to a tough Louisiana law placing new restrictions on doctors who perform abortions. If the law goes into effect, the clinic may have to close down. “It’s important that we can make our own decisions and not be forced to have a child,” the woman said.The Supreme Court’s ruling, expected by the end of June, could signal whether its 5-4 conservative majority, including two justices appointed by President Donald Trump, intends to make bold moves to curtail abortion rights. Anti-abortion activists are hoping the court will undermine and eventually overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v.
U.S. District Judge John deGravelles in 2016 blocked it from taking effect, saying it created an impermissible undue burden on obtaining an abortion and would shut down two of Louisiana’s three clinics - the Hope clinic and a facility in Baton Rouge. The judge, who also concluded that the admitting privileges requirement would provide no significant health benefits to women, said that only the clinic in New Orleans, more than 350 miles southeast of Shreveport, would remain.
Despite the 2016 Supreme Court ruling, the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2018 upheld the Louisiana law, prompting the clinic’s lawyers to take the risky step of appealing to the Supreme Court. They won a preliminary victory in February 2019, when the Supreme Court put the appeals court ruling on hold, meaning the law has not taken effect.
The clinic’s lawyers at the Center for Reproductive Rights, a legal advocacy group favoring abortion rights, reject that assertion and said the Supreme Court should analyze the case though the lens of the 2016 Texas ruling.
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