Tennessee is well on the way to levying its most extensive new regulations on abortion in decades, but supporters of abortion rights hope to make them the last for a while.
Backers of abortion rights delivered 1,000 letters to Gov. Bill Haslam Monday. They asked him to consider vetoing legislation that would impose a 48-hour wait and require women to receive in-person counseling from a doctor before abortions.
Haslam, a Republican, has already signed another measure, Senate Bill 1280, that tightens the inspection rules for abortion providers by requiring them to register as surgical treatment centers.
Francie Hunt, senior field manager for Planned Parenthood of Middle and East Tennessee, said those rules should be the end of new regulations.
“Some of the folks we’ve heard that did vote in favor of this legislation promise that these are the only restrictions that are going to be coming forward on abortion,” she said, “and we hope to hold them accountable to that promise.”
The latest regulations, Senate Bill 1222, come after Tennesseans voted last fall to remove abortion protections from the state constitution. The referendum overturned a decision by the Tennessee Supreme Court in 2000 that the state’s privacy protections extended to abortion services.
Abortion opponents said openly during last fall’s campaign they would pursue the regulations now on Haslam’s desk if they won. The governor supported the effort, saying he sees the regulations as reasonable.
If abortion rights supporters can’t change his mind, they hope the letters will convince him to go no further.
Meanwhile, abortion opponents are showing few signs of pushing the matter in the near future.
Brian Harris, president of Tennessee Right to Life, said enacting the regulations now before Haslam “fulfills the commitment made by Tennessee’s pro-life movement during the long campaign” last fall. He said future regulations would depend on what federal courts say is allowable.
On Air - 90.3 WPLN-FM