Last year, Indiana's Supreme Court rejected a facial challenge to the state's 2022 abortion law. In that case, the Indiana Supreme Court held:
Article 1, Section 1 protects a woman’s right to an abortion that is necessary to protect her life or to protect her from a serious health risk. Yet, this holding does not support Plaintiffs’ claim for a preliminary injunction. That is because they framed their claim as a facial challenge to the entire statute in all conceivable circumstances rather than an as-applied challenge to the law’s application in any particular set of circumstances where a pregnancy endangers a woman’s life or health. (See prior posting.)
Plaintiffs then filed an "as applied" constitutional challenge to the Indiana law. In Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai'i, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky, Inc. v. Members of the Medical Licensing Board of Indiana, (IN Cir. Ct., Sept. 11, 2024), an Indiana state trial court now rejected that challenge. The court said in part:
Plaintiffs have not shown a that S.B.1 materially burdens the rights of any specific patient or well-defined class of patients to access constitutionally protected abortion care. Significant and compelling evidence regarding the policy implications of S.B. 1-- and its effect on medical professionals in particular-- was presented. However, the Court cannot substitute its own policy preferences for that of the Indiana General Assembly and the Court limits its examination to the General Assembly's constitutional authority post-Planned Parenthood. Plaintiffs have not shown an instance where an abortion is necessary to treat a serious health risk but would also fall outside of the Health and Life Exception. Additionally, Plaintiffs have not demonstrated that the Hospital Requirement is materially burdensome to constitutionally protected abortion access, nor that it fails rational basis review as to statutorily authorized (but not constitutionally protected) abortions.
Liberty Counsel issued a press release announcing the decision.
