NEW YORK — As the dust settles on the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the 2003 federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, leading Democrats have responded with attempts to strengthen the country’s abortion laws. Pro-life activists hope to capitalize on the court’s decision by enacting bans on the procedure at the state level.

The day after the court’s decision, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., co-chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, reintroduced the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA). House Bill 1964 would nullify virtually all federal and state limitations on abortion.

As of April 25, the bill had 71 co-sponsors (70 Democrats and 1 Republican) in the House and 13 Democratic co-sponsors in the Senate, where bill S. 1173 was introduced by Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif. Its co-sponsors include presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn.

“The Supreme Court has declared open season on women’s lives and on the right of women to control their own bodies, their health and their destinies,” said Nadler. “Overturning a decision only a few years old, the court has, for the first time since Roe v. Wade, allowed an abortion procedure to be criminalized.”

“The supporters of this are trying to lay the groundwork for enacting it under the next president,” said Douglas Johnson, legislative director with National Right to Life. “The bill’s backers know they can’t enact this under a pro-life president. They hope to get a bunch of lawmakers committed to it, elect a pro-abortion president and then get it enacted into law.”

Johnson said that the effort should not be described as a “codification of Roe v. Wade.”

“This bill goes much further,” he said. “The sponsors have admitted that this will invalidate all of the pro-life laws that the court has admitted are lawful under Roe v. Wade. It would require federal and state funding of abortion without restriction.”

Ban ‘Not Effective’

Most pro-life groups are considering what steps can be taken to enforce the partial-birth abortion ban.

“Hopefully, pro-life groups are asking where they can go from here,” said Kathleen Gallagher, director of pro-life activities for the New York State Catholic Conference. “The court has given us a new green light. Perhaps we can ban abortions after viability with a narrow health exception.”

Father Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life, called for “a vigorous and faithful enforcement” of the ban. “State bans on the procedure should likewise be put into effect in a manner consistent with the federal ban,” said Father Pavone, founder and moderator general of the Missionaries of the Gospel of Life.

Iowa was the first state to move in that direction. Just a week after the court’s decision, the state’s Senate voted 37-13 to end Medicaid funding of partial-birth abortion. The Senate amended a health budget bill to ban funding of the procedure. A House vote is expected soon.

Not all pro-life advocates were supportive of the decision.

American Life League’s Judie Brown doesn’t feel that pro-life groups should support the Supreme Court decision. She described it as an “extraordinary disappointment.”

“I think the decision is awful and it needs to be ignored,” said Brown. “It’s done a greater disservice to the babies and accommodates Roe v. Wade and its progeny.”

She argued that while the court has judged the partial-birth abortion ban constitutional, it won’t prevent a single abortion.

“The justices told the abortionists how to kill a baby by injecting them in the heart,” said Brown. “Never before has the Supreme Court instructed abortionists how to kill children.”

Rather than enforcing the ban, Brown says that pro-life advocates need to “get about the business of substantively protecting babies.”

In a New York Minute

But pro-abortion advocates are still up in arms about the decision.

New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer used the court’s decision as the opportunity to call for wider access to abortion, including partial-birth abortion.

Spitzer unveiled his plans to submit legislation to update New York’s laws pertaining to abortion. The bill (Program Bill 16), known as the Reproductive Health and Privacy Protection Act, would amend or repeal the state’s regulatory statutes establishing a fundamental, statutory right to privacy for women in making personal reproductive decisions.

“In the wake of the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling, this legislation is a necessary measure to ensure that a woman’s fundamental right to privacy in New York is protected at all costs, and not beholden to either archaic state statutes or an overreaching federal government,” Spitzer said.

He received support from abortion providers and advocacy groups such as Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice America.

“The threat to women’s health and privacy, as shown by last week’s dangerous Supreme Court decision, has never been greater,” responded Kelli Conlin, president of NARAL New York. “New York must move swiftly and pass a strong law to protect the fundamental right of a woman, and her doctor, to make private medical decisions about birth control and abortion.”

The New York State Catholic Conference will fight the bill.

“The governor’s bill would guarantee abortion for the entire nine months of pregnancy for any reason or no reason. It would remove the requirement in New York law that only doctors can perform abortions, thereby allowing any health care practitioner — nurses, optometrists, podiatrists — to perform them,” said Gallagher, who described the bill as an abortion industry-written bill handed to the governor by NARAL. “It’s the extreme of the extreme.”

The bill raises other concerns, as well.

“It would require any institution licensed or funded by the state — including Catholic hospitals, schools or agencies — to subsidize or perform abortions, eliminating the right of conscience for every Catholic provider,” Gallagher said.

But she sees the public battle as a great educational opportunity.

“We’re going to be talking about third-trimester babies who are sucking their thumbs and kicking their feet on the ultrasound,” she said. “The pro-life people want to talk about this. Abortion was legalized in New York in 1970, three years before Roe v. Wade,” added Gallagher. “In New York, it’s been on the back burner for 37 years. Now it’s come up to the front burner. We welcome the public discussion.”

Tim Drake is based in

St. Joseph, Minnesota.