WASHINGTON - The Senate voted yesterday to ban the practice that critics call partial birth abortion, sending President Bush a measure that supporters and foes alike said could alter the future of U.S. abortion rights. A court challenge is certain.
Years in the making, the bill imposes the most far-reaching limits on abortion since the Supreme Court in 1973 confirmed a woman's right to end a pregnancy.
This is an enormous day. It's been a long seven-year fight about the issue of partial birth abortion
said Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan. He was a leader of the drive to end abortions, generally carried out in the second or third trimester, in which a fetus is partially delivered before being killed.
This is indeed a historic day said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., lead opponent of the legislation, because for the first time in history Congress is banning a medical procedure that is considered medically necessary by physicians.
The 64-34 vote came three weeks after the House passed the same measure by 281-142.
Bush had urged Congress to pass the ban, which Republicans had pursued since the GOP captured the House in 1995, and the president had said he would sign it into law.
But opponents said the first federal ban on abortion since the Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision was unconstitutional and, like similar state laws, would be struck down.
The president, said Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J. will become the first United States president to criminalize a safe medical procedure. Doctors who violate the ban would be subject to prison terms of up to two years.
The two sides differed widely on the frequency and definition of partial birth abortion, which is not a formal medical term.
The bill defines partial birth abortion as delivery of a fetus until in the case of a headfirst presentation
the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother
or
in the case of the breech presentation
any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother for the purpose of performing an overt act that the person knows will kill the partially delivered living fetus.
Opponents of the legislation argued that, as defined in the bill, it could apply to several safe and common procedures, and that the real goal of the legislation was to erode overall abortion rights.
I see what this is about ... this is about politics
said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., an opponent of the legislation. I never dreamed I'd be down here with senators who think they know more than doctors.
But Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., chief sponsor of the bill, said the procedure was both inhumane and unnecessary. We can't allow this kind of brutality to corrupt us. It makes a much more brutal and harsher country if we stand here and say
yes
for whatever reason
we are going to allow this to occur.
Several groups, including the National Abortion Federation and the Center for Reproductive Rights, plan to challenge the measure in court as soon as it is signed into law. We will take this fight from the Capitol to the courtroom to safeguard the lives and health of women
