(RightWing.org) – Typically, one of the hottest of hot-button topics that has created a wide chasm between Democrats and Republicans for decades is abortion rights. The argument flares up quite a bit in any presidential election year and could become a towering inferno in the current one, the first since the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) 2022 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. However, the recent ruling on the subject out of Arizona is causing some on the Right to take a step back from some of their more hard-line positions.
Making a Distinction
As often happens when a trial court and the first level of the appellate court offer contradictory rulings on a matter, the Arizona Supreme Court took up the case of Planned Parenthood v. Kristin Mayes [Arizona Attorney General (AG)]/Hazelrigg [a medical doctor acting as a guardian ad litem for an unborn child]. One aspect of the 4-2 decision (with Justice William Montgomery having recused himself) that has the Liberals outraged is the reliance upon a Civil War era 1864 law that outlawed and criminalized abortion with the sole exception of acting to save the life of the mother.
Former GOP gubernatorial candidate in Arizona Kari Lake who is now campaigning to represent her state in the United States Senate issued a press release saying that she believes abortion is a states’ rights issue but believes the court went too far in this case. While the Liberals claim this is a 180-degree reversal from her 2022 campaign comments championing the law, that is a gross misrepresentation of the facts.
It is quite the shocker that the virulent proponents of the Leftist Agenda would stoop to such skulduggery, there you have it. Lake finds herself in good company on both fronts, with her statements on the matter echoing those of former President Donald Trump.
My statement regarding today’s Arizona Supreme Court Abortion Ruling⤵️ pic.twitter.com/bNAjXd80TN
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) April 9, 2024
While the original law was written 48 years before Arizona was admitted to the union, it was eventually codified as §13-3603 meaning that it is officially on the books of the STATE. As the opinion notes in the opening of their analysis, the question before the justices was not about the constitutionality of the old statute, instead they were seeking to determine if the 2022 15-week limit on abortion (§36-2322) either repealed the old legislation or created an explicit right for a woman to seek the procedure.
The AZ justices looked at what Dobbs did to abortion laws, which quite frankly did not obliterate a woman’s “right” to abortion as Leftist pundits and politicians are wont to claim, as loudly and frequently as they can get in front of a microphone. What SCOTUS did was unravel the legal gymnastics performed in Roe v. Wade where they determined that the court had erred in its finding that the United States Constitution guaranteed abortion rights and decided that the 10th Amendment made it an issue for each state/district to decide.
With no federal protection in place, the Arizona court found that “§36-2322 does not create a right to, or otherwise provide independent statutory authority for, an abortion that repeals or restricts §13-3603.” What both groups of justices did was examine the law and determine that this issue should be decided either by the state legislatures or the voters, rather than jumping through the hoops of judicial activism.
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