South Carolina’s highest court on Thursday struck down a law prohibiting abortion after six weeks of pregnancy. “We believe that the right to privacy enshrined in our Constitution covers women’s decisions to have an abortion”she justified.
It is with a similar reasoning that the Supreme Court of the United States had sanctuarized, in 1973, in its decision Roe vs. Wade, the right of American women to have an abortion. But last June, in a historic about-face, it considered that this decision was wrong and gave freedom to each State to legislate as it pleases in the matter.
A fractured country
Since then, the country has been fractured between the States having decreed prohibitions, mainly in the South and the Center, and those having reinforced access to pregnancy terminations on their soil, rather on the coasts.
And this landscape is very fluid, each measure being the subject of cascading appeals before the local courts. Since June, restrictive measures have been urgently blocked in several states pending substantive decisions. The South Carolina Supreme Court is the first to issue a final judgment.
“Monumental Victory”
“This is a monumental victory for the protection of legal abortions in the South”, reacted the organization Planned Parenthood, which manages many clinics practicing abortions. This opens up new prospects for women in the region deprived of access to abortion, particularly in the states of Alabama and Tennessee.
However, this is not necessarily the end of the war. In its decision, the South Carolina Supreme Court held that the right to privacy can be ” limit “ provided it is done in such a way ” within reason “. This declaration could allow local lawmakers to introduce new restrictions.