Planned Parenthood Loses One Battle, But the Fight to Protect Children and Unborn Babies Continues in Nebraska

Governor Jim Pillen of Nebraska signed LB 574 (PDF) into law in May 2023, which restricted puberty blockers and mutilation surgery for minors. Any parent or guardian has a cause of action to sue the so-called health care practitioner for violating this law.

The legislature introduced a separate bill to limit abortion after the unborn baby’s heartbeat is detected (about six weeks). This bill didn’t have the votes to end filibuster and invoke cloture. Lawmakers tried again with an amendment to the puberty blocker bill that limited abortion after 12 weeks.

Planned Parenthood sued on the grounds that the amendment was not germane to the bill and violated the single-subject requirement of a piece of legislation.

The Nebraska Supreme Court disagreed and ruled (PDF) that “public health and welfare” is the subject of the abortion and puberty blockers, which means that the amendment to L.B. 574 was germane and did not violate the single-subject requirement.

“We disagree with Planned Parenthood’s contention that it is not possible to identify a single purpose of LB 574 that withstands single subject scrutiny,” the court wrote. “L.B. 574 does regulate both abortion and gender-altering care, but both abortion and gender-altering care are medical procedures, and LB 574 prescribes rules that define if and when such procedures can be performed.”

This is good news for the pro-life cause, but voters in Nebraska may be faced with the choice to amend the state constitution to make killing unborn babies a “fundamental right.” Liberty Counsel reported that if voters pass this initiative, LB 574 will be unconstitutional.

A pro-life initiative also may appear on the ballot, this time to amend the constitution to protect unborn babies after the first trimester. From Liberty Counsel:

Both amendment initiatives have achieved the required 124,465 public signatures to be considered for the November 2024 ballot and the state is undertaking the final step to verify those signatures before giving final approval for the initiatives to go on the ballot.

“Upholding protections for unborn life and children are in everyone’s best interest,” said Mat Staver, founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel. “Abortion has killed millions of lives and mutilating gender procedures have irreversibly devastated innocent children. State legislatures have considerable discretion to protect the most vulnerable among us.”

Photo credit: American Life League (Creative Commons) – Some rights reserved