News

Monday July 19, 2010


Oklahoma Ultrasound Law to Remain Under Injunction

By James Tillman

OKLAHOMA CITY, Oklahoma, July 19, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) Oklahoma District Judge Norma Gurich ruled today that a pro-life ultrasound law will remain under an injunction keeping it from taking effect until at least January 21. The order is a continuation of one issued in May.

The setback is just the latest of many difficulties the law has encountered.

The law, which passed the Oklahoma legislature in March, would require abortionists to show to women and describe in detail an ultrasound of their unborn child within the hour before anesthesia is administered for the abortion. Such a description must include the dimensions of the child, whether the child has a heartbeat or not, and what external members and internal organs the child has.

Democratic Governor Brad Henry vetoed the law, saying that it should contain an exception for victims of rape and incest and that it was an unconstitutional intrusion into women’s privacy, before the legislature overrode the veto in April. Governor Henry often clashes horns with the Oklahoma legislature over pro-life issues: he recently vetoed measures prohibiting health insurance providers in Oklahoma from subsidizing elective abortion, and other pro-life measures.

Judge Gurich blocked enforcement of the law, however, after the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR) of New York filed a suit against the state in May. The CRR argues that the statute interferes with the doctor-patient relationship by compelling doctors to give unwanted speech and by intruding on the patient’s privacy.

Pretrial hearings for the suit are now scheduled for January 21.

Proponents of the the law say it would prevent abortuaries from lying to women about developmental facts regarding their unborn child. Such deception has been documented at multiple Planned Parenthood locations by the pro-life media group Live Action.

Critics of the law also say it is too invasive because it requires doctors to use a vaginal rather than abdominal ultrasound when this would make the image clearer.

Republican state Senator Steve Russell criticized such arguments. “We speak of invasiveness,” Russell said. “[In abortion] an unborn child is forced to have an instrument forced into its body, killing it.”

“We speak of the poor and underprivileged. No one is more vulnerable than a child in the womb. They have no voice except ours.”