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 Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in a legal filing responded to the
U.S. Justice Department's request that the Supreme Court quickly
block the Republican-backed state law while litigation over its
legality goes forward.
The Justice Department on Monday suggested that the justices could
bypass the lower courts already considering the matter and hear
arguments in the case themselves. Paxton's filing said that if the
justices do that, they should overturn Supreme Court precedents
including Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that recognized a woman's
right under the U.S. Constitution to terminate a pregnancy.
"Properly understood, the Constitution does not protect a right to
elective abortion," Paxton's filing said, adding that the state law
furthers "Texas's interest in protecting unborn life, which exists
from the outset of pregnancy."
The Texas measure, one of a series of restrictive Republican-backed
abortion laws passed at the state level in recent years, bans the
procedure after about six weeks of pregnancy, a point when many
women do not yet realize they are pregnant. It makes an exception
for a documented medical emergency but not for cases of rape or
incest.
The Supreme Court already is set to consider a major abortion case
on Dec. 1 in a dispute centering on Mississippi's law banning
abortions starting at 15 weeks of pregnancy. In that case,
Mississippi has asked the justices to overturn Roe v. Wade. A ruling
is due by the end of June 2022.
The Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, previously
allowed the Texas law to be enforced in a separate challenge brought
by abortion providers. In that 5-4 decision on Sept. 1, conservative
Chief Justice John Roberts expressed skepticism about how the law is
enforced and joined the three liberal justices in dissent.
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 Paxton on Thursday also asked
the Supreme Court to reject a bid by the
abortion providers to have the justices
immediately hear their case.
The Justice Department filed its lawsuit
challenging the Texas statute in September,
arguing that it is unconstitutional and
explicitly designed to evade judicial review.
The law is unusual in that it gives private
citizens the power to enforce it by enabling
them to sue anyone who performs or assists a
woman in getting an abortion after cardiac
activity is detected in the embryo. That feature
has helped shield the law from being immediately
blocked as it made it more difficult to directly
sue the state.
Individual citizens can be awarded a minimum of
$10,000 for bringing successful lawsuits.
Critics have said this provision lets people act
as anti-abortion bounty hunters, a
characterization its proponents reject.
The Biden administration has asked the Supreme
Court to quickly restore a federal judge's Oct.
6 order temporarily blocking the law. The New
Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
lifted that order a few days later.
In his Oct. 6 ruling, U.S. District Judge Robert
Pitman in Austin, Texas, found that the law was
likely unconstitutional and designed to avoid
judicial scrutiny. The judge said he would "not
sanction one more day of this offensive
deprivation of such an important right."
(Reporting by Andrew Chung in New York; Editing
by Will Dunham)
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