The Abortion Procedure Ban: Bush’s Gift to his Base

We’ve got to keep our patients safe, and our doctors out of jail.” The speaker is a physician who performs abortions at a large clinic on the West Coast. Her remarks come at a professional meeting attended by many abortion providers, just days after the Supreme Court announced its decision on Gonzales v. Carhart (“Carhart II”), which upheld a ban passed by Congress on so-called “partial birth abortion,” or the procedure doctors call “intact D&E” (also referred to sometimes as “intact dilation and evacuation,” or “D&X,” for “extraction”).

Normally, physicians at professional conferences don’t strategize how to keep out of jail. (The ban provides for a two-year jail term and a $250,000 fine for those convicted of performing this procedure.) Normally, moreover, one does not expect to see Congress or the Supreme Court privilege its own judgments about appropriate medical practice over that of the most relevant professiona...