Kansas’ highest court receptive to protecting abortion rights

TOPEKA, Kan. — Kansas’ highest court appeared receptive Thursday to declaring for the first time that the state constitution recognizes abortion rights, with a majority of the justices skeptical of the state’s argument against the idea as it defended a ban on a common second-trimester procedure.

The state Supreme Court heard arguments in a lawsuit filed by Kansas Cityarea father-daughter physicians against a 2015 first-inthe-nation law that has become a model for abortion opponents in other states. The key issue is whether the Kansas Constitution protects abortion rights independently of the U.S. Constitution, which would allow state courts to invalidate restrictions that have been upheld by the federal courts.

Abortion opponents fear that such a decision by state courts could block new laws — or invalidate existing ones.

Abortion-rights supporters contend language in the state constitution protects a woman’s right to obtain an abortion. Its Bill of Rights says residents’ “natural rights” include “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” and that “free governments” were created for their “equal protection and benefit.”

Yet the justices appeared to struggle with what standard the state courts would use in reviewing abortion restrictions.

The Kansas law at issue bars physicians from using forceps or similar instruments on a live fetus to remove it from the womb in pieces. Such instruments are commonly used in a procedure that the Center for Reproductive Rights has described as the safest abortion procedure in the second trimester.