Abortion in South Carolina

Last updated

Abortion in South Carolina is legal up to when an embryonic heartbeat can be detected, usually around 6 weeks gestation. On May 25, 2023, Governor Henry McMaster signed a 6-week ban, and it took effect immediately. [1] The ban was indefinitely blocked in court on May 26, [2] and reinstated by the South Carolina Supreme Court on August 23. [3]

Contents

In January 2023, the South Carolina Supreme Court had struck down a similar existing law as violating the state's privacy clause under Article 1, Section 10 of the South Carolina Constitution. [4] [5] Passed in 2021, that law had criminalized abortion once embryonic cardiac activity is detectable, which is around six weeks after the first day of the woman’s last menstrual period. [6]

The number of abortion clinics in South Carolina has fluctuated over the years, with fifteen in 1982, eighteen in 1992 and three in 2014. There were 5,714 legal abortions in 2014, and 5,778 in 2015.

53% of South Carolina adults said in a poll that they support "a woman’s right to choose to have a safe and legal abortion," while 37% did not support it. [7]

History

South Carolinian women have a long history of traveling outside the state to seek legal abortions. Critics of efforts by state lawmakers to restrict abortion access say it results in South Carolinian women needing to spend more money and travel greater distances for the procedure. [8]

Legislative history

By the end of the 1800s, all states in the Union except Louisiana had therapeutic exceptions in their legislative bans on abortions. [9] In the 19th century, bans by state legislatures on abortion were about protecting the life of the mother given the number of deaths caused by abortions; state governments saw themselves as looking out for the lives of their citizens. [9] By 1950, the state legislature would pass a law that stated that a woman who had an abortion or actively sought to have an abortion regardless of whether she went through with it was guilty of a criminal offense. [9]

The state was one of 23 states in 2007 to have a detailed abortion-specific informed consent requirement. [10] In 2013, state Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) law applied to medication induced abortions and private doctor offices in addition to abortion clinics. [11] Governor Nikki Haley signed legislation that brought into effect a 20-week abortion ban in 2016. At a ceremonial signing ceremony for the cameras, she was surrounded by children with disabilities. [8]

Republican Representative Greg Delleney was the lead sponsor of South Carolina's law requiring that women view an ultrasound of a fetus before being allowed to have an abortion. He said the ultrasound would enable the woman to "determine for herself whether she is carrying an unborn child deserving of protection or whether it's just an inconvenient, unnecessary part of her body." [12] Rep. John R. McCravy III prefiled HB 3020 in the South Carolina House of Representatives in December 2018. [13] The bill, entitled the "Fetal Heartbeat Protection from Abortion Act", was introduced on January 8, 2018, and referred to the House Judiciary Committee. [14] [15] Previous attempts to pass fetal heartbeat bills in the South Carolina General Assembly failed. [16] [17] The state legislature was one of ten states nationwide that tried to pass similar legislation that year. [18] [17] In April 2019, by a vote of 70–31, the S.C. House of Representatives passed a "fetal heartbeat" bill. The measure passed after five hours of debate. [19]

In February 2021, South Carolina passed a law which would outlaw almost all abortions in that state after a fetal heartbeat is detected; however, that law was temporarily blocked by a judge in March 2021. [20] Representatives from The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) stated in a September 2021 Senate hearing that "contemporary ultrasound can detect an electrically induced flickering of a portion of the embryonic tissue," which differs structurally and functionally from both the lay understanding and medical definition of the term "heartbeat." [6] The state Supreme Court later struck down the law. [4]

In September 2022, the South Carolina Legislature failed in an attempt to ban abortion at fertilization due to objections from female legislators for being too strict. The legislature then failed to make stricter the state's existing 6-week abortion ban due to objections from the caucus that the proposed new law wasn't strict enough. [21]

In May 2023, the General Assembly passed a law similar the February 2021 law that was struck down the Supreme Court. [22] A day later, Circuit Court Judge Clifton Newman issued a temporary restraining order that prevents the law from being enforced until the state supreme court can make a ruling on the law's constitutionality. [23]

In 2023, Republican Representative Rob Harris authored the South Carolina Prenatal Equal Protection Act of 2023, which would make women who had abortions eligible for the death penalty. The bill attracted 21 Republican co-sponsors. [24]

Judicial history

The US Supreme Court's decision in 1973's Roe v. Wade ruling meant the state could no longer regulate abortion in the first trimester. [9] (However, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization , No. 19-1392 , 597 U.S. ___(2022) later in 2022. [25] [26] ) The US Supreme Court heard Ferguson v. City of Charleston in 2001. [27] On appeal, the Fourth Circuit had affirmed, but on the ground that the searches were justified as a matter of law by special non-law-enforcement needs. [28] The Supreme Court had a 6–3 ruling in the case, which was about a South Carolina public hospital policy requiring all pregnant women to be drug tested. The Supreme Court ruled that the US Constitution's Fourth Amendment protected women against unreasonable search and seizures, which mandatory drug testing was. [27] The US Supreme Court reasoned that the interest in curtailing pregnancy complications and reducing the medical costs associated with maternal cocaine use outweighed what it characterized as a "minimal intrusion" on the women's privacy. The Supreme Court then agreed to hear the case. [29] Justice Kennedy pointed out that all searches, by definition, would uncover evidence of crime, and this says nothing about the "special needs" the search might serve. In this case, however, Kennedy agreed that "while the policy may well have served legitimate needs unrelated to law enforcement, it had as well a penal character with a far greater connection to law enforcement than other searches sustained under our special needs rationale." [30]

2023

In Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, et al. v. State of South Carolina, et al., the South Carolina Supreme Court struck down the state's six-week abortion ban and ruled that the state constitution's privacy clause included an implicit right to abortion. [31]

In March 2023, Republican lawmakers proposed a bill, titled the South Carolina Prenatal Equal Protection Act of 2023, which would define fertilized eggs as human beings. The most notable legal ramification of such a change would be that those who obtain an abortion could be subject to the death penalty. The bill offers no exception for pregnant individuals seeking abortion due to sexual assault, incest, or poor fetal health. [32] Such a bill would also create new legal obstacles for those looking to have children through assisted reproductive technology.

Clinic history

Number of abortion clinics in South Carolina by year Number of abortion clinics in South Carolina by year.png
Number of abortion clinics in South Carolina by year

Between 1982 and 1992, the number of abortion clinics in the state increased by three, going from fifteen in 1982 to eighteen in 1992. [33] In 2014, there were three abortion clinics in the state. [34] In 2014, 93% of the counties in the state did not have an abortion clinic. That year, 71% of women in the state aged 15–44 lived in a county without an abortion clinic. [35] In 2017, there were two Planned Parenthood clinics, one of which offered abortion services, in a state with a population of 1,112,199 women aged 15–49. [36] In 2018, there were three licensed abortion clinics in the state. They were in Charleston, Columbia and Greenville. [8] The Charleston clinic was a Planned Parenthood clinic in West Ashley. [8]

Statistics

In the period between 1972 and 1974, the state had an illegal abortion mortality rate per million women aged 15–44 of between 0.1 and 0.9. [37] In 1990, 411,000 women in the state faced the risk of an unintended pregnancy. [33] There were around 5,600 women in South Carolina in 1995 who left the state to get an abortion. [8] There were around 8,801 abortions performed in South Carolina in 1998. [8]

In 2010, the state had nine publicly funded abortions, of which all were federally funded and none were state funded. [38] In 2013, among white women aged 15–19, there were 660 abortions, 620 abortions for black women aged 15–19, 60 abortions for Hispanic women aged 15–19, and 40 abortions for women of all other races. [39] In 2014, 42% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal in all or most cases. [40]

Around 5,600 women in South Carolina in 2015 left the state to get an abortion. This number was one of the highest in the United States. [8] Only 5.9% of abortions performed in the state involved out-of-state residents in 2015. This contrasted with neighboring Georgia, where 14.5% of all abortions that year were for out-of-state residents, and neighboring North Carolina, where 7.5% of all abortions were for out-of-state residents. [8] In 2017, nearly 11,000 South Carolina residents had abortions, but more than half of those were performed out of state. [8] That year, South Carolina had an infant mortality rate of 6.5 deaths per 1,000 live births. [41]

Number of reported abortions, abortion rate and percentage change in rate by geographic region and state in 1992, 1995 and 1996 [42]
Census division and stateNumberRate % change 1992–1996
199219951996199219951996
South Atlantic269,200261,990263,60025.924.624.7–5
Delaware5,7305,7904,09035.234.424.1–32
District of Columbia21,32021,09020,790138.4151.7154.512
Florida84,68087,50094,0503030327
Georgia39,68036,94037,3202421.221.1–12
Maryland31,26030,52031,31026.425.626.30
North Carolina36,18034,60033,55022.42120.2–10
South Carolina12,19011,0209,94014.212.911.6–19
Virginia35,02031,48029,94022.72018.9–16
West Virginia3,1403,0502,6107.77.66.6–14
Number, rate, and ratio of reported abortions, by reporting area of residence and occurrence and by percentage of abortions obtained by out-of-state residents, US CDC estimates
LocationResidenceOccurrence % obtained by

out-of-state residents

YearRef
No.Rate^Ratio^^No.Rate^Ratio^^
South Carolina9,77410.41705,7146.1995.32014 [43]
South Carolina11,03211.61905,7786.1995.92015 [44]
South Carolina10,77311,21885,7366.01005.42016 [45]
^number of abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44; ^^number of abortions per 1,000 live births

Abortion rights views and activities

Protests

Protesters participated in marches supporting abortion rights as part of a Stop the Bans movement in May 2019. [46]

Anti-abortion views and activities

Views

Between 1998 and 2017, the number of abortions that took place on a yearly basis in the state dropped by 5,112.  According to anti-abortion rights group South Carolina Citizens for Life this drop meant that harsh anti-abortion measures in the state worked.  According to South Carolina Citizens Executive Director Holly Gatling in regards to the number of women seeking abortions outside the state over the same period remaining unchanged, "South Carolina Citizens for Life is responsible for South Carolina, not for any other state where women who claim to be from South Carolina abort their children. [...] All we can do is work to reduce the number of abortions occurring in South Carolina, and we have done that and continue to do so." [8]

Governor Nikki Haley said in 2016, "I'm not pro-life because the Republican Party tells me. [...] I'm pro-life because all of us have had experiences of what it means to have one of these special little ones in our life." [8]

Charleston Republican Senator Larry Grooms said in 2018, "I believe that all life is sacred, that an unborn child has a right to life, just like a child that has already experienced birth." [8]

South Carolina state Rep. Nancy Mace said in regard to the six-week "fetal heartbeat" abortion ban in 2019, when on the floor of the House during a 10-minute floor speech about an amendment she introduced, "I was gripping the podium so hard I thought I was going to pull it out of the floor. [...] I was angry at the language my colleagues were using. They were saying rape was the fault of the woman. They called these women baby killers and murderers. That language is so degrading toward women, particularly victims of rape or incest. And I said to myself I'm not going to put up with that bull----. I was nearly yelling into the mic. I gave a very passionate speech to my colleagues and that is what got the exception through." [47]

Violence

On February 23, 2023, anti-abortion protesters physically clashed with abortion rights protesters outside of a clinic in Greenville, South Carolina. [48] Due to this physical confrontation and over 300 others since the beginning of 2021 that led to 20 arrests at the clinic, in October 2023 the Greenville County Council's Public Safety Committee voted to prohibit firearms, weapons, body armor, open flames, bicycles and the blocking of pedestrian walkways and entrances to businesses at protests. [49]

Related Research Articles

Abortion in Oklahoma is illegal unless the abortion is necessary to save the life of a pregnant woman.

Abortion in Alabama is illegal. Under section 26-23H-4 of the Code of Alabama in the U.S. state of Alabama, it is unlawful for an abortion to be performed unless it is deemed absolutely necessary in order to prevent a serious health risk to the pregnant woman. There are no exceptions for rape or incest.

Abortion in Georgia is legal up to the detection of an embryonic heartbeat, which typically begins in the 5th or 6th week after the onset of the last menstrual period (LMP) or in two to three weeks after implantation. This law came into force on July 20, 2022, almost a month after the U.S. Supreme Court's Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, No. 19-1392, 597 U.S. ___ (2022) ruling. In 2007, mandatory ultrasound requirements were passed by state legislators. Georgia has continually sought to legislate against abortion at a state level since 2011. The most recent example, 2019's HB 481, sought to make abortion illegal as soon as an embryonic heartbeat can be detected; in most cases that is around the six-week mark of a pregnancy. Many women are not aware they are pregnant at this time. An injunction was issued against this bill by a federal judge, who ruled that it contravened the Supreme Court's 1973 ruling. A poll conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2014 found that 49% of Georgians believed abortions should be illegal in all or most cases vs 48% legal in all or most cases.

Abortion in Louisiana is mostly illegal as of August 1, 2022.

Abortion in Missouri is illegal, with abortions only being legal in cases of medical emergency and several additional laws making access to abortion services difficult. In 2014, a poll by the Pew Research Center found that 52% of Missouri adults said that abortion should be legal vs. 46% that believe it should be illegal in all or most cases. According to a 2014 Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) study, 51% of white women in the state believed that abortion is legal in all or most cases.

Abortion in Arkansas is illegal except when it is necessary to save the life of the mother. Doctors determined to have performed an abortion face up to 10 years in prison and fines up to $100,000.

Abortion in Delaware is legal up to the point of fetal viability. 55% of adults said in a poll by the Pew Research Center that abortion should be legal and 38% stated it should be illegal in all or most cases. There was a therapeutic exceptions in the state's legislative ban on abortions by 1900. Informed consent laws were on the books by 2007. In 2017, Senator Bryan Townsend, D-Newark introduced legislation to try to make clear that abortion would remain legal in the state in case 1973's Roe v. Wade ruling was overturned. The legislation was subsequently updated. Attempts have been made to introduce mandatory ultrasound laws, but they failed to get out of committee. State legislators tried to move ahead the week at which a woman could get a legal abortion in 2019.

Abortion in Idaho is illegal from fertilization. Following the overturning of Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022, abortion in Idaho was criminalized by the trigger law which states that a person who performs an abortion may face two to five years of imprisonment. The ban allows exceptions for rape, incest, or maternal health. The law took effect on August 25, 2022.

Abortion in Kansas is legal. Kansas law allows for an abortion up to 20 weeks postfertilization. After that point, only in cases of life or severely compromised physical health may an abortion be performed, with this limit set on the belief that a fetus can feel pain after that point in the pregnancy. The state also had detailed abortion-specific informed consent requirement by 2007. Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) law applied to medication-induced abortions and private doctor offices in addition to abortion clinics were in place by 2013. In 2015, Kansas became the first state to ban the dilation and evacuation procedure, a common second-trimester abortion procedure. State laws about abortion have been challenged at the Kansas Supreme Court and US Supreme Court level. On August 2, 2022, Kansas voters rejected a constitutional amendment that would have allowed the Republican-controlled legislature to restrict or ban abortion in Kansas, following the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

Abortion in Kentucky is illegal. There were laws in Kentucky about abortion by 1900, including ones with therapeutic exceptions. In 1998, the state passed legislation that required clinics to have an abortion clinic license if they wanted to operate. By the early 2010s, members of the Kentucky Legislature attempted to ban abortion in almost all cases and had also introduced the early abortion bans. Prior to 2019, Kentucky law prohibited abortions after week 22. This changed when the state legislature passed a law that moved the prohibition to week 6 in the early part of the year. In that year, 57% of people in Kentucky said abortion should be "illegal in all or most cases." A bill passed and made effective in April 2022 lowered the threshold to 15 weeks, the second most restrictive limit in effect in the United States behind Texas, and introduced regulations that made abortion illegal until it was blocked in federal court.

Abortion in Minnesota is legal until fetal viability. The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled the Minnesota Constitution conferred a right to an abortion in 1995 and the DFL-led Minnesota Legislature passed and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz signed into law a bill in 2023 to recognize a right to reproductive freedom and preventing local units of government from limiting that right, making Minnesota the first state in the nation in the post-Roe era to ensure residents have a legal right to an abortion.

Abortion in Mississippi is illegal. The new law took effect on July 7, 2022, after Mississippi State Attorney General Lynn Fitch certified on June 27, the Supreme Court decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization on June 24 of that year.

Abortion in Nebraska is legal up to the 12th week of pregnancy, after new legislation was signed in May 2023. In June 2023, a lawsuit was filed to challenge the state's abortion law. The legislation establishing the law contained provisions concerning both abortion and gender-affirming care, while the state constitution prohibits bills that legislate on multiple issues at once.

Abortion in North Dakota is illegal. The state's sole abortion clinic relocated to Minnesota.

Abortion in Ohio is legal on request up to the point of fetal viability. After viability, abortion is legal if, in the professional judgement of an attending physician, the abortion is necessary to protect the pregnant individual’s life or health.

Abortion in Rhode Island is legal. On June 19, 2019, the legal right to abortion was codified into Rhode Island law by passage of the Reproductive Privacy Act.

Abortion in Tennessee is illegal from fertilization, except to "prevent the death of the pregnant woman or to prevent serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman".

Abortion in West Virginia is illegal, with few exceptions.

Abortion in Iowa is legal up to 20 weeks of gestation. A 6-week abortion ban has been indefinitely blocked in court.

Abortion in Wyoming is currently legal due to a temporary court injunction.

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