Plenty of state legislators have sought cover for the rejection of a rape and incest exception in the new abortion ban by pointing out the bill includes a provision allowing for use of so-called emergency contraceptives if administered prior to the time pregnancy could be determined. Yet their voting records indicate this is pretty weak cover.
A bill specifically allowing use of emergency contraceptives in cases of rape was overwhelmingly rejected by the state Senate this year. Every senator who supported the abortion ban voted against the emergency contraceptive bill. But this is nothing new.
A similar emergency contraceptive bill was similarly rejected by the state Senate last year. With one exception — Democrat Garry Moore of Yankton — once again every senator who voted for the abortion ban this year voted against the emergency contraception bill the year before.
Likewise, a 2004 bill allowing such use of emergency contraceptives was killed in a House committee. Every legislator who voted to kill that bill voted for a similar abortion ban that passed that session and, with the exception of one legislator who was absent, to override a veto of it.
This may go beyond simply being two-faced politically. It raises the interesting question of how a court should interpret the contraceptive provision in the abortion ban in cases of rape and incest when the Legislature has specifically rejected authorizing such usage for three years running.
Hypocrisy in anything whatever may deceive the cleverest and most penetrating man, but the least wide-awake of children recognizes it, and is revolted by it, however ingeniously it may be disguised.
Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
You need to look at this for what it is. The South Dakota Legislature is, for the most part, looking for attention from the outside world. This is their 15 minutes of fame so just let them have it and it will go away.
The Abortion ban will not get through the District courts and the Supreme Court will never hear it. It is mute and they understand that so voting for it gave them the opportunity to say “I tried”
Local legislators and lobbyists, who before this were not know outside the State are now all of a sudden national figures and that is what this is all about. The collective chant was “somebody please look at us” and they got it.
I could not agree more. Just Google any of the suspects, Hunt, Looby, Unruh, etc. The nation is looking and guess what they see.