Ruth Bader Ginsburg eviscerates Texas' abortion law: 'It is beyond rational belief'

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg struck down the premise of the Texas abortion law reviewed by the Supreme Court.

(Image credit: TIM SLOAN/AFP/Getty Images)

published 27 June 2016

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg didn't just slam the two provisions in the Texas abortion clinic law that the court ruled against Monday — she went ahead and took down the very premise of the law, too. In a separate concurrence to Justice Stephen Breyer's majority decision that Texas' provisions placed an "undue burden" on a woman's constitutional right to an abortion, Ginsburg suggested that the law's very claim that it was created in the interest of protecting women's health was a whole lotta baloney.

"The Texas law called H.B.2 inevitably will reduce the number of clinics and doctors allowed to provide abortion services. Texas argues that H.B.2's restrictions are constitutional because they protect the health of women who experience complications from abortions. In truth, 'complications from an abortion are both rare and rarely dangerous,'" Ginsburg wrote, citing a brief by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

Furthermore, Ginsburg pointed out that medical procedures, "including childbirth, are far more dangerous to patients, yet are not subject to ambulatory surgical-center or hospital admitting-privileges requirements." The provisions the Supreme Court struck down required that abortion facilities meet the same standards as ambulatory surgical centers, and that doctors who perform abortions have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.