Reproductive Rights

In May of 1998, in accordance with the 1997 Wisconsin Act 219, doctors in Wisconsin stopped performing abortions and women choosing to terminate their pregnancies were forced to cross state lines to do so. The law defined the beginning of human life at the point of conception and imposes a life sentence for abortion providers in Wisconsin. A federal trial is scheduled to test the law's constitutionality. Requests from abortion providers to have the courts issue temporary restraining orders, which would allow access to abortion services while the law is being challenged, have been denied.

The outcome of the legal challenge to the Wisconsin statute will have a tremendous impact on the extent to which other states restrict abortions and it may well result in the reversal of Roe v. Wade. In addition to Wisconsin's challenge to Roe, Congress is expected to override President Clinton's veto of the Partial Birth Abortion Ban of 1997 in the fall of 1999.