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Abortion Europe

ABC v. Ireland

The European Court of Human Rights has decided the Ireland abortion case. The Court held Ireland’s law violated one of the claimant’s rights by failing to provide a mechanism for her to obtain a legal abortion, which in Ireland is only available under limited circumstances. The decision doesn’t seem as bad as some had feared. The decision seems to afford Ireland the ability to prohibit abortion in many circumstances, and so doesn’t seem to usher in a Roe v. Wade-like regime of abortion on demand. I haven’t, though, had a chance to read the lengthy judgment carefully yet and so I will plan to post a more detailed statement in due course. 

UPDATE: Here are some links with commentary on the decision. http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/2010/12/16/no-european-roe-v-wade/

http://mirrorofjustice.blogs.com/mirrorofjustice/2010/12/it-could-have-been-much-worse-the-european-court-of-human-rights-and-irish-law-restricting-abortion.html

http://www.eclj.org/Releases/Read.aspx?GUID=b533673b-73b0-43ab-b7c6-07e091a1e706&s=eur

The decision rejected the argument that there is an international right to abortion and that is the best news. The Court’s judgment reflected a much greater willingness to defer to the judgments of the democratic branches, as opposed to the views of judges, than we’ve seen in decisions in this country (such as Roe and Casey). It was a welcome sign that the Court continually referred to the “unborn” and to the “unborn child.”  

As others have noted, there are some negative aspects to the decision. The Court found that Irish law protects a woman’s decision to have an abortion when her life is at risk and, as the Court’s analysis makes clear, that doesn’t mean “the life of the mother” discussed in such classic cases as the hysterectomy situation when the mother has uterine cancer. In the US, the “health” exception prevents a legislature from any significant prohibitions on abortion (as opposed to regulations concerning abortion such as parental notice laws or waiting periods), and so it is possible that the “narrow” exception recognized by the ECHR will be expanded. 

But, overall, the decision, despite its flaws, was about as much as could have been hoped for.  

Richard M.

Richard Myers

Richard S. Myers, the Vice-President of UFL, is Professor of Law at Ave Maria School of Law, where he teaches Antitrust, Civil Procedure, Conflict of Laws, Constitutional Law, and Religious Freedom. He is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Kenyon College and earned his law degree at Notre Dame, where he won the law school's highest academic prize. He began his legal career by clerking for Judge John F. Kilkenny of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Professor Myers also worked for Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue in Washington, D.C. He taught at Case Western Reserve University School of Law and the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law before joining the Ave Maria faculty. He is a co-editor of St. Thomas Aquinas and the Natural Law Tradition: Contemporary Perspectives (Catholic University of American Press, 2004) and a co-editor of Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought, Social Science, and Social Policy (Scarecrow Press, 2007). He has also published extensively on constitutional law in law reviews and also testified before Congressional and state legislative hearings on life issues. Married to Mollie Murphy, who is also on the faculty at Ave Maria School of Law, they are the proud parents of six children - Michael, Patrick, Clare, Kathleen, Matthew, and Andrew. http://www.avemarialaw.edu/index.cfm?event=faculty.bio&pid=11705E7D4E0111010366