Justices block abortion law

Roberts joins Supreme Court’s liberals to put restrictive Louisiana regulation on hold.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday temporarily blocked a Louisiana abortion regulation that was expected to close all but one or two of the abortion clinics in the state.

The case, June Medical Services vs. Gee, has been closely watched as an early test of whether the high court would stand behind its precedents in the area of abortion or begin to make it easier for states to restrict the procedure.

The decision came on 5-4 vote with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joining with the four liberals.

It was the latest sign that Roberts does not want to move too quickly in shifting the court to the right, despite the recent addition of two appointees of President Trump.

The justices acted on an emergency appeal filed by abortion rights advocates who accused the conservative U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans of upholding a regulatory law in Louisiana that was nearly identical to a Texas law that the high court struck down in 2016.

The justices agreed to put the law on hold while lawyers for the Center for Reproductive Rights prepare an appeal that seeks a review of the 5th Circuit’s ruling.

Three years ago, the Supreme Court struck down the Texas law that added new restrictions on abortion clinics by a 5-3 vote with Justice Anthony M. Kennedy in the majority. The court’s opinion said the Texas regulations were unconstitutional because they would not improve the quality of medical care and would sharply limit access to abortion for hundreds of thousands of women who lived outside a major urban area.

The decision in the Texas case was handed down a few months after Justice Antonin Scalia died. Dissenting then were Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. Since then, they have been joined by Trump’s two appointees, Justices Neil M. Gorsuch and Brett M. Kavanaugh.

Many have expected the new conservative majority to reconsider the past abortion decisions, including the landmark Roe vs. Wade.

The key issue in the Louisiana case is a provision that requires every physician who performs abortions to have “active admitting privileges at a hospital” within 30 miles.

A federal judge had blocked the Louisiana law after finding that only two of six abortion doctors said they were able to obtain the required admitting privilege. They said hospitals did not want to extend privileges to doctors who rarely sent patients for emergency care. They also said the hospitals acted of out of fear of antiabortion protesters.

But last year, the 5th Circuit reversed the judge’s ruling by a 2-1 vote and upheld the law.

Two weeks ago, lawyers for the Center for Reproductive Rights filed an emergency appeal asking the high court to again put the law on hold. Nancy Northup, the group’s president, said the 5th Circuit had “brazenly ignored recent U.S. Supreme Court precedent squarely on point.”

Late Thursday, she praised the high court’s decision.

“The Supreme Court has stepped in under the wire to protect the rights of Louisiana women,” Northup said. “The three clinics left in Louisiana can stay open while we ask the Supreme Court to hear our case. This should be an easy case — all that’s needed is a straightforward application of the court’s own precedent.”