On March 9, Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon signed Enrolled Act No. 29 / House Bill 126, the Human Heartbeat Act (full text), into law (press release). The law prohibits an abortion when there is a detectable fetal heartbeat. The only exception is a "medical emergency", defined as a need to terminate a pregnancy to avert the mother's death or where there is serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.
The law then sets out an alternative less-restrictive set of provisions which will take effect only if fetal heartbeat ban is found to be unconstitutional. These are the provisions that were in effect before the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs. These provisions ban abortions after viability, except when necessary to preserve the woman from an imminent peril that substantially endangers her life or health. These alternate provisions also require that in most cases an abortion patient be given an opportunity to view an active ultrasound. The alternative provisions also set out lengthy procedures where a minor is seeking an abortion.
Governor Gordon's Signing Letter (full text) questions the constitutionality of the new law. It says in part:
Despite the upright, moral intentions of HEA 29, I believe this act very likely puts us back in the all too familiar and unfortunate territory of pro-life litigation....
The central obstacle remains the Wyoming Supreme Court's interpretation of Article 1, Section 38 of the Wyoming Constitution in State v. Johnson...
In the Johnson case, the Wyoming Supreme Court by a vote of 4-1 held that Wyoming's nearly total abortion ban and its medication abortion ban violate Art. I, §38, of the Wyoming Constitution which provides that every competent adult has the right to make his or her health care decision, subject to reasonable and necessary restrictions imposed by the legislature. (See prior posting).
The Governor's signing letter also said that he would have preferred if the law had contained exceptions for rape and incest.
WyoFile reports on these developments.
