Red state court rules that minors do not need parental consent to have an abortion

The Montana Supreme Court ruled Wednesday against a law that requires parental consent for minors to have an abortion.

The government is siding with Planned Parenthood, which challenged a 2013 status called the “Parental Consent to Abortion Act of 2013.” seconds in the court ruling. Justice Laurie McKinnon, who issued the court's opinion, wrote in the ruling that the “classification created by the Legislature” violated a minor's right to “control her body.”

“The right of a minor to control her reproductive decisions is one of the most fundamental rights she possesses, and since the State has not demonstrated a real and significant relationship between the statutory qualification and the claimed purposes, we consider that the Law of consent violates the Constitution of the state of Montana,” the ruling states.

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen's office, which appealed a district court decision in the case in 2023, said Wednesday's decision was against the will of the people of Montana.

“Wednesday's decision further demonstrates how radical and out of touch the Montana Supreme Court is with its constituents,” Chase Scheuer, press secretary for Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, told the Daily Caller News Foundation . “Instead of doing the right thing to protect the health and well-being of babies and children, the judges sided with the campaign's donors: Planned Parenthood.”

The Consent Act went into effect on July 1, 2013, but a Planned Parenthood complaint put it on hold, Reuters informed.

“It is ridiculous to believe that a child's parents should not be informed in advance of a major medical procedure, and Montanans agree,” Scheuer told the DCNF. “In 2012, 70 percent of Montanans supported a parental notification law, which was also challenged by Planned Parenthood and will go to trial. The people's elected representatives in the Legislature also passed the law of parental consent to protect the right of parents to have a say in their children's well-being.After 11 years of litigation, the Supreme Court immediately took it to parents across the state.What will the court decide next, that the parents do not need to consent to the underage marriage of their child?

Planned Parenthood argued that the Consent Act violates the “equal protection” and “right to privacy” clauses of the Montana constitution, according to the court's ruling. The state argued that the Consent Act protects minors from “sexual victimization by adult males” and from “hasty or poorly reasoned decisions that often result from a minor's underdeveloped decision-making capacity.” .

The State also presented the argument that parents have the right to “direct the care of their child”, noting that the Consent Law “respects the minor's right to privacy and access to abortion”. according to the sentence.

Judge Jim Rice, who agreed with the “final parts” of the case, wrote in a separate opinion that the court did not consider the matter in a timely manner.

“Justice Rice was right about one thing in his concurrence: The public deserves better than what happened in this case, and the courts must do better,” Scheuer told the DCNF. “Attorney General Knudsen will continue to protect the health and well-being of Montana's young women. We are reviewing our possible next steps.”

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