(Georgia Recorder) — Georgia’s six-week abortion ban will soon be back in effect after a Georgia Supreme Court decision Monday shut off access to expanded services just one week after a Fulton County judge ruled that the 2019 law is unconstitutional.
The state’s highest court ruled that the six-week ban will be back in effect as of 5 p.m. Monday while the state’s appeal is being considered.
Local prosecutors, though, will continue to be blocked from acquiring health records where an abortion has been performed under the state Supreme Court’s ruling.
Six justices – Michael P. Boggs, Sarah Hawkins Warren, Charles J. Bethel, Carla Wong McMillian, Shawn Ellen LaGrua and Verda M. Colvin – backed the decision to block the lower court’s ruling.
Justice Nels S.D. Peterson was disqualified from the proceeding for an unstated reason, and Justice Andrew A. Pinson did not participate.
Justice John J. Ellington dissented on the decision to let the ban go back into effect while the appeal is pending.
“Fundamentally, the State should not be in the business of enforcing laws that have been determined to violate fundamental rights guaranteed to millions of individuals under the Georgia Constitution,” Ellington wrote in his dissent.
“The ‘status quo’ that should be maintained is the state of the law before the challenged laws took effect,” he wrote.
The last week was reminiscent of 2022 when Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert C. I. McBurney first struck down the law because it was passed before the U.S. Supreme Court ended the federal right to an abortion.
Then, too, the Georgia Supreme Court reinstated the six-week ban after a week and at Attorney General Chris Carr’s behest.
The Supreme Court ultimately sided with the state a year ago on what was considered a narrow legal issue. Now, the court is taking up the heart of the legal challenge: Does the Georgia Constitution’s protections for liberty and privacy include a right to an abortion?
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
