"It is rarely remembered that the Virginia antiabortion lobby's long, wasteful and ultimately failed effort to regulate state abortion clinics out of business started as a humdrum bit of legislative housekeeping," a Washington Post editorial states.
The "irrational proposal" was a "patently unconstitutional effort to do precisely what the Supreme Court, in 1992, explicitly forbade states to do: impose 'unnecessary health regulations' to erect 'a substantial obstacle to a woman seeking an abortion,'" the editorial explains. Further, according to the editorial, the U.S. Supreme Court "settled the question (again)" when it ruled that provisions in "a Texas statute [HB 2] similar to Virginia's was an affront to reproductive freedom."
The editorial continues, "The fact that the laws in both states did nothing to safeguard or enhance women's health, and were transparently intended simply to limit abortion rights, was not lost on the high court." According to the editorial, the justices in their ruling held that "states should stop using legislative gimcrackery, such as applying regulations intended for full-service hospitals to outpatient abortion clinics, as a means to impede a woman's right to make her own reproductive-health decisions."
The high court's decision "sealed the fate of Virginia's law," the editorial states, adding, "On Monday, the state Board of Health voted to exempt abortion clinics from the law." However, the editorial notes that abortion-rights opponents "have little regard for court precedent and are sure to continue their attacks."
Meanwhile, the damage that followed the regulations "has been substantial," the editorial contends, noting that "[j]ust 14 clinics provide abortion services in Virginia, down from about 20 when the legislature passed its bill," as least some of which closed as a direct result of the legislation.
The editorial asserts, "Now the stringent construction and design standards may no longer be imposed, but other onerous regulations apply -- and go far beyond those faced by similar-sized outpatient health facilities providing colonoscopies, cosmetic surgery and other procedures more dangerous to patient health than abortions." Meanwhile, "[t]here is no evidence" that the abortion care provided "in the state's clinics [is] unsafe or unhygienic," the editorial states.
The editorial concludes, "The rule of law has prevailed and abortion services remain available in Virginia. Sadly, they also remain vulnerable" (Washington Post, 10/25).
