Strict State Abortion Laws Drawing National Attention As City-Level Rules Skate Under Radar
Several cities have used zoning restrictions to create prohibitive hurdles for abortion clinics in recent years. The most recent one, in a city in Tennessee, would effectively ban abortions within the city's borders.
The Washington Post:
The Abortion War Goes Local As ACLU Lawsuit Seeks To Thwart Town’s Ban
The ACLU of Tennessee filed a lawsuit against a Nashville suburb Wednesday to stop a zoning ordinance that effectively bans surgical abortions within the city’s borders, an antiabortion tactic that is putting town councils on the front lines of one of the most polarizing issues in American life. The suit, joined by the national ACLU and filed on behalf of the nonprofit national women’s clinic Carafem, calls the Mount Juliet City Commission’s zoning ordinance “unconstitutional.” The ordinance is part of “the state’s relentless attack on abortion rights, enacting a multitude of restrictions designed to shutter clinics that have provided safe and affordable abortion care and impose unconscionable obstacles,” the lawsuit states. (Wax-Thibodeaux and Cha, 12/18)
Nashville Tennessean:
ACLU Files Lawsuit Against Mt. Juliet Over Surgical Abortion Zoning
A lawsuit has been filed against Mt. Juliet by the ACLU, ACLU of Tennessee and a law firm over the city's zoning ordinance aimed at restricting surgical abortion clinics. The lawsuit is on behalf of carafem, a national abortion provider that opened a clinic in Mt. Juliet on Crossings Circle near Providence Marketplace on March 1. (Humbles, 12/18)
