What
is Partial Birth Abortion?
1. A caller asked Tuesday on the Jay Sekulow Live Radio Show,
"What is a partial birth abortion?
CAUTION : The following writings
by Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas contain graphic and disturbing
language describing this procedure. This language was presented
in the actual Court opinions of the Partial Birth Abortion case,
Stenberg v. Carhart, 530 U.S. 414 (2000). The following
description may not be suitable for children or teens.
Justice Scalia, dissenting in the Stenberg case, said:
I am optimistic enough to believe that, one day, Stenberg
v. Carhart will be assigned its rightful place in the history
of this Court's jurisprudence beside Korematsu and Dred
Scott. The method of killing a human child-one cannot even
accurately say an entirely unborn human child-proscribed by
this statute is so horrible that the most clinical description
of it evokes a shudder of revulsion.
Id. at 953.
(Complete PDF Opinion needs adobe reader)
Justice Thomas wrote the following in his dissent:
We were reassured repeatedly in Casey that not all regulations
of abortion are unwarranted and the States may express profound
respect for fetal life. Under Casey, the regulation before us
today should easily pass constitutional muster. But the Court's
abortion jurisprudence is a particularly virulent strain of
constitutional exegesis. And so today we are told that 30 States
are prohibited from banning one rarely used form of abortion
that they believe to border on infanticide. It is clear the
Constitution does not compel this result.
Id. at 1020.
In speaking of what partial birth abortion is, Justice Thomas
described the procedure:
In the almost 30 years since Roe, this Court has never described
the various methods of aborting a second- or third-trimester
fetus. From reading the majority's sanitized description, one
would think that this case involves state regulation of a widely
accepted routine medical procedure. Nothing could be further
from the truth. The most widely used method of abortion during
this stage of pregnancy is so gruesome that its use can be traumatic
even for the physicians and medical staff who perform it. .
. .
After dilating the cervix, the physician will grab the fetus
by its feet and pull the fetal body out of the uterus into the
vaginal cavity. At this stage of development, the head is the
largest part of the body. Assuming the physician has performed
the dilation procedure correctly, the head will be held inside
the uterus by the woman's cervix. While the fetus is stuck in
this position, dangling partly out of the woman's body, and
just a few inches from a completed birth, the physician uses
an instrument such as a pair of scissors to tear or perforate
the skull. The physician will then either crush the skull or
will use a vacuum to remove the brain and other intracranial
contents from the fetal skull, collapse the fetus' head, and
pull the fetus from the uterus.
Id. at 986-87 (citations omitted). Further on in the opinion
the Justice writes: "In cases in which the physician inadvertently
dilates the woman to too great a degree, the physician will
have to hold the fetus inside the woman so that he can perform
the procedure. Id. at 988.
Justice
Thomas complete opinion in PDF
Format
PDF
Explicit information Letter Concerning Partial Birth Abortion
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