Illinois Abortion Law Moves into New Phase.(Legislation)

The battle over Illinois's never-enforced parental involvement law, which began in 1995, has taken several new twists in the past few months. That includes a new measure introduced in February that further enlarges the pool of adults who could authorize a minor girl to have an abortion.

Under the original law, the list of parties an abortionist about to kill the unborn child of a minor girl under 18 could notify included a parent, a step-parent living in the household, a grandparent, or a legal guardian.

The 1995 law allowed minor girls to seek a judicial bypass or declare in writing that she had been neglected or abused. However, the Illinois General Assembly left it to the state Supreme Court to come up with rules for how a girl can seek a waiver from a judge and appeal a ruling that did not give her the waiver.

When the justices at the time didn't, the Illinois ACLU went to court and a federal judge blocked the law from taking effect

All that changed last September when the state Supreme Court unexpectedly issued the rules. It said that the judge hearing the girl's petition should try to make a decision at the end of the hearing, or within 48 hours, according to published accounts.

With that as backdrop, in January Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan asked the Chicago-based federal court to dissolve the order barring the law from being enforced. Her position was explained in the papers she filed with the court.

"It is my duty to uphold the Constitution and to defend the laws of this state if they are constitutional," Madigan said in the statement. She added that "courts have upheld many parental notice ...