Bill allowing judges to approve minors' abortions gets House OK

Friday, 18 February 2000

http://www.azstarnet.com/public/dnews/LX8152.html

By Howard Fischer
Capitol Media Services

PHOENIX - State lawmakers voted yesterday to try again to restrict abortions on minors - but not before adding some new provisions.
Yesterday's House action brings the state closer to reinstating a court-voided law that bars minors from terminating their pregnancy without parental consent. The Senate has approved the bill in similar form.
The measure, SB 1238, contains a court-mandated requirement that allows girls to get permission from a judge for an abortion if they choose not to involve their parents. It also contains specific deadlines for judges to act - omissions that resulted in courts' voiding earlier versions of the law.
Abortion rights supporters also succeeded in adding several provisions, including one that allows a girl who says she has been raped or is the victim of incest to avoid either procedure. Instead, a doctor could terminate the pregnancy without further approval.
Abortion foes fought that change.
``There would be that incentive for them to lie about what happened to them,'' said Rep. Dean Cooley, R-Mesa. He said that if there really is rape or incest, parents or judges should be involved because a crime would have been committed.
Rep. Lou-Ann Preble, R-Tucson, said doctors should not be able to make these decisions. ``As a mother of six daughters there is absolutely no way I would want them to be in a position of having them go to a physician without my approval,'' she said.
Responding, Rep. Susan Gerard, R-Phoenix, said: ``We're talking about daughters who might not have mothers like Mrs. Preble or myself.''
She said some mothers refuse to accept or even ignore that a father might have molested her child.
Rep. Linda Binder, R-Lake Havasu City, said the idea that parents should be involved in all these decisions is a 1950s TV ``Ozzie and Harriet fairy tale.''
Cooley said pregnant teens still have the option of going to court. Rep. Debora Norris, D-Sells, countered that these girls already have been through ``horrendous situations'' and should not be forced to jump through other legal hoops.
Another amendment approved over the objection of abortion foes expands the list of who can approve an abortion further. It adds grandparents, aunts, uncles and adult siblings.
Cooley said the House vote, which followed more than four hours of debate, is not the end of the issue as far as he is concerned.
The measure has to go to a conference committee to iron out differences with the Senate-passed version. Cooley said he hopes to strip amendments he does not like there.
That move has a political risk: Without those changes the measure may not be able to get sufficient votes for final approval. That would leave Arizona without any law restricting abortions on minors.
Arizona's first law, approved in 1989, was struck down as ``unconstitutionally vague.''

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