Right Side of the Rainbow

You can hear the oral argument in Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood here. (Link requires, and launches, Real Player.) The case, heard today by the U.S. Supreme Court, concerns the “constitutionality” of a New Hampshire statute requiring that a parent be informed when a minor child seeks an abortion.

I put constitutionality in quotation marks because of course the statute is constitutional. (Where in the text or history of the Federal Constitution can you find injunction against a state statute requiring that parents be told when their children seek medical treatment?) The real question is whether the statute can be reconciled with the relevant body of constitutional law, as refined mostly recently by Associate Legislator Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.

If the Court invalidates New Hampshire’s statute, as I think likely, I’d re-pass a modified version that requires parents be informed after their child has an had an abortion. Is there a “constitutional right” for a child to not only have an abortion, but to also keep it a secret from her parents? The absurdity of the Court’s abortion jurisprudence should in all instances be highlighted.

ADDED — Good gawd! Notice the psychotic questioning from Justices Souter, Kennedy and Breyer. They’re suggesting to you — or more precisely, to New Hampshire’s attorney general, Kelly Ayotte — that the statute is unconstitutional because (get a load of this):

There may be an instance, albeit not even life-threatening, where 1) the child nevertheless has to have an abortion right now (right now!), 2) doesn’t want her parents informed, 3) not one judge can be located to grant judicial by-pass (no cell phones in New Hampshire, one supposes), and 4) the girl’s blood pressure is presently high, thus somehow, someway, in Justice Breyer’s medical judgment, preventing her from having children in the future unless she kills this one now and without her parent’s knowledge!