Wisconsin Legislators Forgo Vote, Keep Abortion Penalties

State lawmakers handed a victory to anti-abortion interests Tuesday by deciding not to vote on repealing unenforceable criminal penalties for doctors who perform abortions.

Abortion rights advocates had sought to wipe out the penalties, which were rendered unenforceable in 1973 by the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, in case the court later reversed itself.

Activists on both sides had anticipated that the repeal measure could provoke the first up-or-down vote on the abortion issue since a Supreme Court decision last summer opened the door to some state regulation of abortion.

The Assembly hedged slightly. It voted 57 to 39 to keep the repeal bill in the amendment stage and not bring it to the floor for a final vote. Nevertheless, that move in effect killed the measure, pro-choice legislators said.

“It’s dead,” Rep. Rebecca Young, a Democrat, said minutes after the vote. “This is the end of the bill for this session.”

The Wisconsin vote come at the beginning of another contentious year for state legislators forced to deal with new proposals on restricting abortion.

The Indiana House of Representatives on Monday approved three measures restricting abortions. The state Senate is considered less likely to approve them, but one legislative aide said that anti-abortion forces in Indiana have been underestimated this year.

The measures approved Monday, along with an earlier bill, would ban abortion based on the sex of the unborn child, require viability testing of the fetus after 20 weeks of gestation and outlaw abortion of those determined to be viable unless the mother’s life is endangered by the pregnancy. One bill would require that a woman be fully informed about abortion and then wait at least 24 hours before undergoing the procedure.