The judge who temporarily blocked North Dakota’s abortion ban shouldn’t have that discretion
MINOT, N.D. — The judiciary, both generally and specifically, has too much power to enjoin laws.
I’m talking about the injunctions you’re always hearing about in the headlines when some hot-button issue is taken to court and a judge waves the magic gavel and sets aside the will of the people, or at least their elected representatives.
It happened recently here in North Dakota.
After the U.S. Supreme Court correctly struck down improperly decided judicial opinions that manufactured a right to an abortion in the U.S. Constitution, our state’s law banning abortion in most instances, which was designed to take effect when those precedents were struck down, became an issue.
People who oppose that impending ban are in the process of taking it to court. They’d like North Dakota’s judiciary to discover in our state constitution a right to an abortion in the same way the federal judiciary, in handing down Roe v. Wade, discovered a right to abortion in our national constitution.
