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Texas can enforce its abortion ban since 1925, the state Supreme Court ruled Friday evening, a decision that exposes abortion providers to lawsuits and financial penalties if they continue to conduct the procedure.
The court overturned a Houston district judge, who on Tuesday had temporarily blocked the entry into force of the state’s old abortion law. That law sanctioned the practice of an abortion, by any method, with a sentence of two to 10 years in prison.
Friday’s decision does not allow prosecutors to file criminal cases against abortion providers, but exposes all people who collaborate in obtaining an abortion to fines and lawsuits.
On June 24, the Federal Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the historic 1973 case that claimed access to abortion is protected by the constitution. The Texas legislature passed an “active law” last year that would automatically ban abortion from the time of fertilization 30 days after a Supreme Court ruling, which usually comes a month after the initial opinion.
Abortion rights groups filed a lawsuit Monday in hopes of extending the period in which the procedure remains legal in Texas. They argued that the 1925 ban was effectively repealed when the Supreme Court ruled in Roe v. Wade, and therefore cannot be enforced now.
“These laws are confusing, unnecessary and cruel,” Marc Hearron, a senior lawyer for the Center for Reproductive Rights, who is not part of the lawsuit, said in a statement. “Texas’ ban on activation is not scheduled to take effect for another two months, if not longer. This nearly 100-year-old law prematurely bans essential health care, even though it has clearly been repealed for some time.” .
Because the legislature never repealed its pre-Roe statute prohibiting abortion, however, some conservative lawmakers and law scholars argued that abortion was again illegal in Texas at the time the Court Supreme announced his decision.
“While those statutes were inapplicable while Roe was in the books, they are still Texas laws,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said June 24. “Under these pre-Roe statutes, abortion providers could be criminally liable to perform abortions starting today.”
Texas clinics began rejecting patients on the day of the federal court ruling. Non-profit organizations that help people access and pay for abortion have stopped distributing aid.
Some clinics resumed abortion on Tuesday, after the Houston judge temporarily stopped enforcing the state’s pre-Roe ban, though Paxton said he would still try to prosecute them if the Supreme Court ‘state overturned the temporary restraining order, which it did on Friday.
Whole Women’s Health, one of the abortion providers that is part of the case, said Saturday it would stop her work in Texas again.
“This morning, our clinic staff has embarked on heartbreaking conversations with patients whose appointments need to be canceled, and our clinics have begun the liquidation process,” said President Amy Hagstrom Miller in a statement.
A hearing is scheduled for July 12 to decide on a more permanent removal order. The case will eventually be heard on its merits, although effectively the active law that will go into effect in about two months will ensure that abortion is banned in Texas, regardless of whether the 1925 law applies.
Some Conservative lawmakers have said they intend to continue legislating on abortion in the next session, which begins in January. With illegal abortion in Texas, except in rare cases to save the mother’s life, lawmakers said they will focus their attention on improving adoption programs and preventing pregnant Texans from leaving the state to receive the procedure.
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