{"id":250684,"date":"2021-09-02T12:43:12","date_gmt":"2021-09-02T17:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=250684"},"modified":"2021-09-21T16:42:28","modified_gmt":"2021-09-21T21:42:28","slug":"legal-viability-humanity-preborn-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/legal-viability-humanity-preborn-children\/","title":{"rendered":"Legal scholars agree ‘viability’ doesn’t determine humanity of preborn children"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

Legal scholars of the past and present have for decades described the horrific decision in Roe v. Wade<\/em> as being on a collision course<\/a> with itself. Soon, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the\u00a0Dobbs v. Jackson Women\u2019s Health Organization<\/em>\u00a0case, which centers around a Mississippi abortion law restricting abortion after 15 weeks gestation. The question the court will likely answer is, \u201cUnder the Constitution, may a State prohibit elective abortions before viability?\u201d<\/p>\n

According to University of St. Thomas School of Law professor Teresa Collett<\/a>, who co-authored a brief<\/a> in support of Mississippi in the case, “This is the first time in almost 30 years that the U.S. Supreme Court has shown any interest in permitting states to limit abortion prior to viability, commonly understood to occur at or before 24 weeks of pregnancy.”<\/p>\n

The so-called “viability rule” was based on an arbitrary cut-off,\u00a0typically\u00a0defined<\/a> as the age at which a child can survive outside the womb. It first appeared in\u00a0Roe v. Wade<\/em>, and was not determined based on science but instead was a \u201clegislative\u201d or political move by the Court.<\/p>\n

Well before the Dobbs<\/em> case, legal scholars saw the political motive behind a viability rule for abortion.<\/p>\n

Viability for political purposes<\/strong><\/p>\n

In his book “Abuse of Discretion,”\u00a0<\/em>author and legal scholar Clarke Forsythe defined the original term “viable” to traditionally mean “able to live.”<\/p>\n

“Thus a ‘viable pregnancy’ meant a pregnancy that was progressing,” Forsythe claimed.<\/p>\n

Thomas W. Hilgers, M.D., a Fellow in Obstetrics and Gynecology, agreed, writing in his 1972 work<\/a>, “Induced abortion: A\u00a0documented report”: “The term viable means ‘capable of living’ and the unborn is VERY MUCH ‘capable of living’ before his\/her time of ‘viability’ is reached. This is evidenced by the fact that the child in the ‘pre-viability’ period is very much alive.” Hilgers was citing “Dorland’s Medical Dictionary, 23rd Edition.”<\/p>\n