March 20, 2006VOL. 44, NO. 6Oakland, CA

South Dakota's new law banning abortions hailed

PIERRE, S.D. (CNS) -- Two Catholic bishops hailed South Dakota’s new law banning nearly all abortions, but they also urged efforts to transform people’s hearts and minds to reject abortion and build a culture that respects all life from the moment of conception to natural death.

On March 6 in Pierre, the state capital, Gov. Mike Rounds signed into law a bill prohibiting all intentional abortions except those to save a mother’s life.
Bishop Blase J. Cupich of Rapid City said South Dakota citizens and their elected officials “can be justifiably proud of their efforts to restore the rights of the unborn child,” but “a change in law and structures,” he said, “is not sufficient.”

Society must build a culture of life that “begins with the unborn” and also ensures livable wages, education, adequate health care, help for single mothers and “an end to the death penalty,” he said.

South Dakota’s new law is the most sweeping ban on abortion adopted in any state since 1973, the year the U.S. Supreme Court legalized abortion virtually on demand in its Roe v. Wade decision.

The Women’s Health and Human Life Protection Act specifically exempts women from any criminal conviction or penalty for obtaining an abortion. But it says that anyone who performs an abortion except to save a mother’s life commits a Class 5 felony, which is punishable by a fine up to $5,000 and up to five years in prison.

The law does not apply to medical treatment “that results in the accidental or unintentional injury or death to the unborn child.”

The South Dakota House of Representative passed the bill Feb. 24 by a vote of 50-18. The Senate had approved it Feb. 22, by a vote of 23-12 after slightly amending an earlier version adopted by the House. The House vote Feb. 24 incorporated the Senate's amendment.

back to top

home