Florida Supreme Court Upholds 15-Week Abortion Ban, Allows Abortion Rights Amendment on Ballot
The amendment would limit “government interference with abortion.”
The Florida Supreme Court,6-1, upheld the law banning abortion at 15 weeks, triggering another law banning it after six weeks.
However, the Court also decided to put the question on the ballot in November.
My head is swimming!
Abortion Law
BACKGROUND
Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the 6-week abortion ban into law last April. However, it could only go into effect if the state Supreme Court upheld the 15-week ban.
The 15-week ban was enacted in July 2022, a month after SCOTUS finally overturned Roe v. Wade.
The ACLU filed the lawsuit on behalf of Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida. The abortion mill claimed the law violated the Florida Constitution’s Privacy Clause.
A trial court placed an injunction on the 15-week abortion ban shortly after it went into effect.
The state appealed. The Florida Supreme Court allowed the law to go into effect as the legislation went through the courts.
First stop: First District Court of Appeals.
The First District Court of Appeals ruled that “Planned Parenthood could not establish irreparable harm, as a result of the stay” of the law.”
Therefore, the court threw out the injunction and allowed the law to proceed.
The plaintiffs appealed to the Florida Supreme Court. Once again, the court did not issue a stay, but the justices agreed to hear the case.
TODAY
The case In re T.W., 551 So. 2d 1186 (Fla. 1989) allowed the Privacy Clause to cover abortion.
The Florida Supreme Court ruled that Planned Parenthood did not “demonstrate a likelihood of success on the merits of the claim.” Therefore, Planned Parenthood did not get its injunction, but the court approved the First District Court of Appeal’s outcome.
“The Privacy Clause of the Florida Constitution does not mention abortion or include a word or phrase that clearly incorporates it,” wrote Justice Jamie Grosshans. “Era-appropriate dictionary definitions and contextual clues suggest that abortion does not naturally fit within the rights at issue.”
Gosshans pointed out that historical sources also did not “support a conclusion that abortion should be read into the provision’s text.”
“Thus, we cannot conclude that in 1980, a voter would have assumed the text encompassed a polarizing definition of privacy that included broad protections for abortion,” continued Grosshans.
Therefore, the Florida Supreme Court ruled that Planned Parenthood could not “demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt” that Florida’s law banning abortion after 15 weeks is unconstitutional.
As we all know, it is hard to overturn precedent, especially regarding sensitive issues.
Well, the Florida Supreme Court similarly approached the precedent problem as SCOTUS did with Roe:
In deciding how to resolve that tension, we again emphasize that T.W. failed to acknowledge the longstanding principle that statutes are presumed to be constitutional. This error led the Court to read additional rights into the constitution based on Roe’s dubious and immediately contested reasoning, rather than evaluate what the text of the provision actually said or what the people of Florida understood those words to mean. The decision to extend the protections of the Privacy Clause beyond what the text could reasonably bear was not ours to make. As a result, we removed substantial authority from the people’s elected representatives to regulate abortion—a profoundly unique and complicated issue that affects society in many significant ways.
Accordingly, for the reasons given above, we find T.W. to be clearly erroneous. Based on our established test for assessing stare-decisis issues, we now ask whether there is a valid reason not to recede from T.W. See State v. Poole, 297 So. 3d 487, 506-07 (Fla. 2020) (outlining a two-part framework on stare-decisis issues).
Dismantling T.W. also meant rescinding any decisions based on the T.W. ruling, including Gainesville Woman Care, LLC v. State, 210 So. 3d 1243 (Fla. 2017) and North Florida Women’s Health Counseling Servs., Inc. v. State, 866 So. 2d 612 (Fla. 2003). The same thing happened to rulings based on Roe.
Abortion Amendment
The Florida Supreme Court also decided that abortion laws can appear on the November ballot.
The proposed amendment states:
Limiting government interference with abortion.— Except as provided in Article X, Section 22, no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.
The Supreme Court rejected arguments from organizations such as Susan B. Anthony:
Here, the proposed amendment will affect the government “only in the general sense that any constitutional provision does” by requiring compliance with a new constitutional rule. Solar Energy Choice, 188 So. 3d at 830. It will not require any of the branches of government to perform any specific functions nor would it substantially alter their functions. Instead, it primarily restricts the authority of the legislative branch to pass legislation that would “interfere” with abortion under certain circumstances. This is not the type of “precipitous” or “cataclysmic” change to the government structure indicative of substantially altering or performing the functions of multiple branches of government that the singlesubject rule is intended to prevent. See, e.g., In re Advisory Op. to Att’y Gen. re Limits or Prevents Barriers to Local Solar Elec. Supply, 177 So. 3d 235, 244-45 (Fla. 2015) (concluding that although the proposed amendment would limit the authority of the Legislature and other governmental entities to regulate in certain areas, it did “not substantially alter or perform the functions of multiple branches of government producing ‘precipitous’ or ‘cataclysmic’ changes”).
The Court concluded that the amendment for the ballot “embraces but one subject-limiting government interference with abortion-and matter directly connected therewith.”
The Court also found nothing wrong with the amendment’s title and summary. Previous court rulings said that the title and summary do not need to “explain every detail or ramification” of the amendment, explain the interpretation, or explain what might happen in the future because of the amendment.
I mean, ballots would be pages long if amendments had to include all of that!
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Comments
So now Florida is solidly in the Biden/Democrat camp for the November election? I hope I m wrong.
No.
Next.
No need to hope, dingus.
You ARE wrong.
I am getting messages from progressive sources saying Florida is back in play. Upvoted. When will the Reps give up on that loser issue? Women can go to some nearby state to get an abortion anyway, granted it’s a few hours drive from Florida, but if they want to do it, they’ll do it.
Do Progressives and Democrats ever support anything wholesome, anything productive, or is it mostly border invasions and abortion?
Bizarre statement given it was Republicans tanked the border control bill
Well, there goes Flordia for the GOP in Nov. 60% of Floridian’s support abortion to viability (20 weeks).
Hysterical. In 2022, DeSantis won voters who were ‘Dissatisfied’ with Roe v Wade being overturned by 9-points. In that same exit poll, Biden only had a 39% approval rating with voters and polling today shows that he’s even more disliked. Joe Biden is not wining Florida this fall.
Incidentally, Florida Hispanics are far less supportive of abortion than Hispanics are in other states, or nationally.
Valid points, but none of those are the same as supporting a 6 week ban. DeSantis pushed this because he was running for President, when he thought he needed to cater to the right.
The FL voter drive has over 60% support. GOP has been creamed at the ballot box on abortion even in deep red states, because even a lot of republicans are fine with abortion up to 12-15 weeks. A six week ban will get overturned by the voters, count on it. The only question: whether the voters split the ticket.
Voters usually split the ticket when abortion is on the ballot directly. I think DeSantis signed the 6 week ban because he needed the Legislature’s permission to run for Prez. They had to repeal the resign to run law. Still, this is going to supercharge Dem turnout in FL. They need to get 60%, so every turnout trick and method known will have to be used. And many FL voters are too old to care about Abortion, so expect the Democrats to do a big tour with Taylor Swift to register the young women.
Abortion access ballot measures, even in red states are getting 58%. 60% will be a slam dunk in FL. Expecting voters to split a ticket is high risk. If Trump nominates DeSantis, its game over, because he signed this law.
But why take the chance? There will probably be fewer than 10 women who will have their babies rather than abort because of the law. If they want an abortion they’ll drive to where they can get one. And for this we risk losing everything else?
Until the “beginning moment of life” is defined (the left doesn’t want this to be decided) abortion will continue to be a mess qxross the country. So, while we won state’s rights in the reversal of Roe, pro life advocates and courts are missing/avoiding the obvious/most important point to be made. Life is included in the constitution so, even a state referendum allowing for abortion, approved by voters should be nullified. Second, telling a state it no longer has authority to regulate medical procedures is absurd.
A state has no authority not granted to it by its constitution. If the Florida constitution is amended to prohibit the legislature from banning the murder of babies, then the legislature will no longer have such authority.
And no, “life” is not included in the US constitution. There is not one word in the US constitution that would require a state to ban murder. So if the referendum were to pass then only way it could be overturned would be if SCOTUS were to reinterpret the 14th amendment to extend the equal protection clause to unborn babies. And the chances of it doing that any time soon are extremely slim.
That would open up a real can of worms too, because unborn babies are not counted for the Census. Only persons “born” are recognized by the plain text of the 14th amendment.
Republicans are determined to lose every election. Single women are the swing vote and this is their single issue. Ann Coulter recently
https://youtu.be/j9v0Qpjl-K0?t=549
I think you’re clearly right This – abortion is really hurting Republicans. I don’t think you can blame all Republicans for this. I’m glad it was overturned by the Supreme Court, I think. I’m a pro-life zealot, I think it was disgusting to call that a Constitutional right But it has been sent back to the states, that’s all we ever wanted, And guess what pro-lifers? We’re getting slaughtered. There have been seven direct to the people votes. And the tiniest restriction on abortion loses overwhelmingly. In Montana, in Kentucky, Kansas, states that Trump won by 20 points and it isn’t Republicans per se, I think pushing this, it is these pro-life zealots. who just – they don’t care, I’m going to be pure, and did you see my write-up in the Catholic Insight magazine? And you know, you guys, you’re like the corporate Republicans who will not give up on their cheap labor. We have to tell them, “We can give you some things, but we can’t give you everything or we’re just gonna lose.”
Nearly 2 dozen states have banned or severely limited abortions since SCOTUS ruled on R v. W back in 2022 (including Kentucky).
https://www.cnn.com/us/abortion-access-restrictions-bans-us-dg/index.html
The question isnt federalism. red states are fine to do whatever they want. The question is: can GOP win a national election with a 6-week ban in Florida and a ballot measure to overturn it (60% of FL supports overturning this measure). The answer is likely, no. People might split the ticket, vote to overturn the ban but vote for Trump, but I wouldnt count on it.
“There have been seven direct to the people votes. And the tiniest restriction on abortion loses overwhelmingly”
In the regions of the country where the residents are comfortable and committed to the defense of life, such votes do not even arise, so it’s a meaningless statistic.
More correctly, most abortion banning states do not allow citizen initiated referendums at all, and never did.
Single women are NOT a swing vote. They are solidly (D) by 3:1. Their mothers (suburban women) are the swing vote.
I think 15 weeks is good but don’t pass a law unless it’ hugely bipartisan.
You want long enough so that nearly everybody has time to find out they’re pregnant, i.e. so that no horror stories show up in news. There’s irregular periods, there’s not keeping track, there’s never expecting to get pregnant because birth control has been in use so long, etc. The black swan shows up in the news and you’re screwed.
A fat chick could go 9 months and never know (or care) that she is pregnant.
The wisest political course is to embrace Federalism and accept that the individual States will have different laws based on the culture and character of that State then respect the will of the people in those States. Anyone trying to sell a national ‘compromise’ as wise politics is offering fool’s gold b/c inevitably this national ‘comprise’ will not respect the will of the people in their States.
The states themselves are divided internally. If abortion restriction is the Republican brand, Republicans lose every election. In each state.
Unborn babies nationwide were unavailable for comment.
It doesn’t help them to lose control of the federal government, when the women who want to abort them will drive to a nearby state to do it if necessary. SCOTUS guaranteed there will always be states available to provide that service.
No. Not in ‘every State’. Alabama passed a very restrictive abortion law in 2019 and has GoP Gov, both US Senators, 6/7 HoR and massive majority in both State legislative chambers.
Will some political groups get over their skies and try to push restrictions that are too out of touch with the culture and character of their State? Yes they will. But not every State has weakened culture/character that allows infanticide. The over zealous folks prone to go too far out of touch must forst change the culture/character of their State’s voters then work on bans b/c until the policy proposals match the will of the voters it either won’t pass as a referendum or their will be backlash against the politicians who pushed it.
We all know Alabama’s a red state. Although with a nudge they elected a Dem senator for a few years recently. The Dems play this game much better than the Reps do.
Florida has long been a swing state. It was in 2000. DeSantis was narrowly elected governor over a Dem who stank of obvious corruption, and only with the help of Trump’s endorsement. It is NOT a safe state.
Mostly true though DeSantis won a second term in 2022 by nearly 20% margin of victory.
Looking at the 2022 vote totals we find that DeSantis increased the the number of votes by over 500K from 2018 while about 900K LESS d/prog (2018) voters pulled the d/prog lever in 2022. That translated into an over 1.5 Million vote margin in 2022.
The difference in voter registration is striking. In 2018 the d/prog held an advantage of over 100K registrations. The latest numbers show a current GoP voter registration advantage of over 851K.
Florida today isn’t the Florida of 2018. ‘Safe’ is relative and nearly every State can be won by either political party. They said I would much rather be holding the hand of cards the GoP holds in FL than the ones the d/prog hold. Ultimately it is up to Trump’s campaign not to be complacent and to work to bring in the victory in FL and every other State.
12 to 15 weeks is common in Europe. The problem here is that the pro abortion people were much better prepared for Roe being overturned. If you propose a law limiting abortion to 15 weeks it is presented in the news as preventing all abortions. Say you want parental consent for minors and you are enabling incest and preventing teens from getting abortion. Any law you propose the pro aborts have thought of the worst case scenario and present that as what will happen most of the time. Not sure how but you have to educate and counter that. Most people want abortion legal yes but do they want their teenage daughter to have one without them knowing? I read that 70% favor parental consent, over 60% favor a limit of around 14-15 weeks, over 75% think that abortion clinics should meet the same standards as any other medical clinic. So it is possible to win some battles for limits but it is just like gun control. When we know that the ultimate goal of gun control is no guns we do not want to give an inch, when the pro aborts know the ultimate goal is to eliminate abortion they are not willing to give an inch.
The difference from Europe is that the EU doesn’t have the religiously motivated groups that want all abortion banned, so reasonable compromises are possible. Christianity is totally dead in the EU.
The question is, is there any point in winning elections if we can’t use such victories to prevent babies from being murdered.
Well, Jefferson faced a similar dilemma when he realized that abolition was not going to pass in his lifetime, and if he kept fighting for it he would just keep losing. So he decided to devote his fighting for other issues that he thought he had some chance of winning, and left slavery to be abolished by the next generation or the one after. He didn’t give up on the hope that it would be abolished one day, but he stopped fighting for it. He achieved the things he did, only because he was willing to make that compromise.
The thing is, though, how sure are we that giving up on the babies, and standing by while they’re being slaughtered, would help us win elections?
rhhardin says “Single women are the swing vote and this is their single issue”, but like most analyses of swing voters and how to get them it assumes that pandering to them will not affect ones base.
In this case a substantial portion of the Republican base are people who are in it primarily to stop the government-sanctioned holocaust, and if the Party gives up that goal how many of them will see no further reason to vote? Or will even decide that since both parties are now OK with the slaughter, they should vote on other issues and end up voting for Democrats?
It would be a better “fight” to make adoption easier and less expensive would be a good start. And to focus on fixing the issues that cause people to seek abortions in the first place – Making certain that teenagers know where babies come from is a big one (a lot of the same people who want the 6-week abortion bans oppose allowing this basic lesson in biology to be taught to middle- or high- school students). Making certain that preventative methods are easily available is another (being able to purchase basic birth control pills, or morning-after pills from the pharmacy without a prescription) are two good starting points.
Yeah. This is absolutely a part of the debate that gets short shrift. Contraception including the ‘morning after pill’ should be fairly easy to get. Same for sex ed as long as we are talking about procreation, ovulation cycle, how long sperm are viable, how to have sex while reducing risk of pregnancy AND showing the scary STD photos +charts listing off % of sexually active folks who have STD.
Dude this is some projection, those opposing 6 week abortion bans were and still are far more informed on biology that your side. Is this where you pretend an electrical impulse is a heart?
Speaking of sides and biological nous, which side thinks that males can get pregnant again?
Neither, some on the left think that women/man is a social construction ie gender is a distinct category compared to sex.
Stop motivating us to invent time travel to go back and slap some sense in to your mother on your conception night! 😂
A valid question and one the Right needs to ask more often. My best answer is that the priority of victories must be future victories. You cannot squander victories into losses or you lose the long game. This is the game that the Left plays — they care only about power and discard clients the second it would cost them further gains of power. Until the Right has defeated the Left utterly in the cultural sphere, flexing power that it does not have is a habit the Right should unlearn.
Maybe the question is when at what point may there be restrictions and what might those restrictions be?
Let them explain their own extremism.
This is pretty silly, the moderate position is Roe V Wade. 22 weeks is a perfectly justifiable position ethically and legally.
That’s not what we had under Roe. We had late term dismemberment while breaching the birth canal. We had ‘Shout your abortion!’. We had ‘Tweet your abortion!’. We had people being persecuted by the Feds for prayers against abortion. So take your gaslighting bullshyte and stuff it up your a$$, liar.
Err no, Roe v Wade divided pregnancy into three trimesters, and declared that the choice to end a pregnancy in the first trimester was solely up to the woman. In the second trimester, the government could regulate abortion, although not ban it, in order to protect the mother’s health.
In the third trimester, the state could prohibit abortion to protect a foetus that could survive on its own outside the womb, except when a woman’s health was in danger.
I’m sorry that you are so badly informed.
“foetus?” You’re a Brit, why do you care?
“I’m sorry that you are so badly informed.” We’re all sorry you’re here.
You are the one badly informed. “Except when a woman’s health is in danger” means any woman who wants an abortion, even as she’s in labor, can simply claim that her heath would somehow be affected, even minimally, and she’ll easily find some doctor to sign off on it. That is what it meant in practice and that was standard throughout the USA.
Fu*k you, liar.
@Milhouse
“You are the one badly informed. “Except when a woman’s health is in danger” means any woman who wants an abortion, even as she’s in labor, can simply claim that her heath would somehow be affected, even minimally, and she’ll easily find some doctor to sign off on it”
No it does not, that’s not how the law functioned at all. Sure there is some ambiguity and thus some difference on how that it was applied but your position is just factually incorrect as per the stats for abortion in the third trimester.
“The vast majority of abortions occur during the first trimester of a pregnancy. In 2021, 93% of abortions occurred during the first trimester – that is, at or before 13 weeks of gestation, according to the CDC. An additional 6% occurred between 14 and 20 weeks of pregnancy, and about 1% were performed at 21 weeks or more of gestation. These CDC figures include data from 40 states and New York City, but not the rest of New York.”
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/03/25/what-the-data-says-about-abortion-in-the-us/
Sorry you are just wrong
@Paul
Awww facts hurting your feelings snowflake
Lol, you are such a pathetic troll.
@paul
This is you admitting you live in a bubble, a bubble which you seem unable to find a coherent argument to defend. Your automatic response to those challenging your views is to try and insult them. This is telling, seems to me when push comes to shove tou can’t actually justify your position.
Nah, feelings not hurt. Just tired of demonstrating what a pathetic, lying cu*t you are. Now be gone, c*nt.
@paul
“Demonstrating” is doing a lot of work here 😂😂😂
Bart, that is exactly how it worked. Even in those few states that officially banned late term abortion, anyone who wanted one could get it because the state had to allow it whenever a woman claimed that her heath was affected in any way whatsoever. It was trivial to get a doctor to sign off on it, and then the state had to allow the abortion, even at the very end of the 9th month, and even while the woman was already in labor. That is simply a fact, it is how it worked.
And of course in Dem-controlled states women don’t even need to invoke their health. In Dem-controlled states, to this day, a woman can have an abortion at any time, including during labor, just because she wants one.
And Dem leaders support abortion after birth, in cases where a baby survives an abortion. 0bama supported it, Ralph Northam supported it, and so do hundreds of Dem legislators.
Your statistics don’t demonstrate anything at all about this, and you surely know that. Your citing them as if they did just shows your own dishonesty. The number of late term abortions bears no relation to how easy they are to get, or how legal they are.
Bro, where you’re from abortion is much harder to get than in Florida 😂😂
I dunno team, maybe planned parenthood could invest its time, money and effort in to encouraging people not to fuck around and be responsible?
This is you admitting you have no idea what Planned parenthood do, its so embarrassing reading your comments
Given that you’re a Brit who can’t be bothered to proofread his posts before he hits “submit,” I propose that your comments are far more embarrassing.
Begone.
Having a point would make your posts a whole lot better. Do better
LOL. Do you even irony, bro?
Your “Ricky Retardo” schtick has just about worn out its welcome.
Again, I say…. begone.
@steve59
Irony would suggest you have a point yet you seem unable to actually provide one. Your inability to provide a coherent response suggests massive amounts of projection on your part.
@SillyDingus…. you REALLY don’t proofread what you write before you hit the Submit button.
You’re the dumbest kind of troll: no humor, no snark, no witty entendres.
Just lame regurgitations of the basest forms of “I know what you are, but what am I” crap. Pee Wee Herman would be proud of you.
Go back to Scotland. I hear they like people like you.
@steve59
Oh Steve, tut tut, why would I need any jokes. Your being that just fine 😉
No, you are the one with no idea what PP does. It is an abortion business. It does not do cancer screening, and everything else that it does is secondary to its abortion business.
And their growing side hustle in providing ‘transition services’ to go along with selling dismembered and /or intact fetal remains.
Your deliberately evocative language really demonstrates your lack of argument on the abortion issue. Anyone who uses such language is using emotion over facts
Accurate language seems to upset your emotions.
@commochief
Accurate language. Sure buddy, you keep believing your nonsense.
@FartE: you really are a f*cking imbecile.
Your presence here lowers the collective IQ by at least 10 points.
Why are you here?
BartE
So to be clear you are unreservedly denying that Planed Parenthood is offering ‘transition services’ and also unequivocally stating that Planed Parenthood did/does not offer fetal remains, in whole or in part, for sale?
No its not its a non-profit providing birth control, advice and abortions. Its one of the largest providers of sex education in the US as well as providing millions of appointments with respect to birth control, an order of magnitude more than the abortion services.
You’re just wrong on the facts
LOL. Now the silly little Brit troll is arguing semantics with Milhouse, of all people.
I think I’ll grab some more popcorn.
@steve59
The points highlighted above are not semantics they are fundamental differences. Factually milhouse is just wrong
Not-for-profit status doesn’t mean it isn’t a money-making business. And all its money is from abortion. That is its reason for existence, and the counseling is just to get customers for abortion. It rakes in big money every year.
We know what they do. James O’Keefe just showed us again a few weeks ago.
James okeefe jesus christ you need better sources. No wonder you believe any old shite.
Dear dingus: I didn’t have to go far to find the perfect rebuttal to your grammatical flatulence. See your comment at 3:13PM for the citation. I made sure I carefully included your poor spelling.
“Your automatic response to those challenging your views is to try and insult them. This is telling, seems to me when push comes to shove tou can’t actually justify your position.”
Really? When has O’Keefe ever been wrong?
What “Planned Parenthood” should be about is actually planning parenthood when the adults are ready for such a commitment.
Until then people should be encouraged to act responsibly when having sex, or abstaining altogether until they are prepared to handle the consequences of their actions if prevention doesn’t work.
You know, kinda like planning parenthood when one is ready to become a parent.
I know right…mind blow 😂😂
Abortion is the only issue remaining in which the Republicans are way out of step with the public, but it’s a deal breaker come election time for crucial independents. So putting this directly to the people is not only the most democratic solution (little “d”), but it also keeps the fanatics from dragging the Party into defeat, and thereby allowing the progressives to remain in power where they will undoubtedly kill as many babies as possible to save their Goddess Earth.
I suspect there are far more people in support of saving babies lives than killing them…the Democrat media just doesn’t want you to know this so you remain demotivated to support anyone they tell you not to support.
Remember, Black Lives Matter 😂😂
“Limiting government interference with abortion.— Except as provided in “.Article X, Section 22, no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.”
You can be sure that not a single abortionist will ever decide there is a health issue that does not warrant abortion past viability. Notice please there is no restriction on when an abortion can be performed to preserve the woman’s health.
There are plenty of doctors who believe that all pregnancies are bad for a woman’s health, and that any woman’s health would be improved by not being pregnant, so they will sign off on an abortion for any woman no matter how healthy she is.
Trump holds the line on abortion — won’t endorse a national limit.
TDS sufferers hardest hit.