SAN FRANCISCO --In a ruling with coast-to-coast effect, a federal judge declared the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act unconstitutional yesterday, saying it infringes on a woman's right to choose.
U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton's ruling came in one of three lawsuits challenging the legislation President Bush signed last year.
She agreed with abortion rights activists that a woman's right to choose is paramount, and that it is therefore irrelevant whether a fetus suffers pain, as abortion foes contend.
The act poses an undue burden on a woman's right to choose an abortion
the judge wrote.
The challenge was brought by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and the ruling applies to the nation's 900 or so Planned Parenthood clinics and their doctors, who perform about half the 1.3 million abortions done each year in the United States.
Federal judges in New York and Nebraska also heard challenges to the law earlier this year from other abortion-rights forces but have yet to rule.
Planned Parenthood lawyer Beth Parker welcomed the ruling, saying it sends a strong message to the Bush administration that the government should not be intruding on very sensitive and private medical decisions.
In a statement, the Bush re-election campaign said: Today's tragic ruling upholding partial birth abortion shows why America needs judges who will interpret the law and not legislate from the bench ... John Kerry's judicial nominees would similarly frustrate the people's will and allow this grotesque procedure to continue.
Kerry spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter said the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee voted to restrict late-term abortions when the measure contained a clear exception for life or health of women.
However George Bush pushed through a different piece of legislation that failed to protect the health of women and that is what the court struck down today she said. When John Kerry is president he will appoint judges that are committed to upholding the Constitution
not pursuing an ideological agenda.
Justice Department spokeswoman Monica Goodling said the government will continue to devote all resources necessary to defend this act of Congress
which President Bush has said 'will end an abhorrent practice and continue to build a culture of life in America.'
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