Parental Consent Abortion Bill Passes in Senate
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WASHINGTON — A bill that would make it a crime to take a pregnant girl across state lines for an abortion without her parents’ knowledge passed the Senate yesterday, but vast differences with the House version stood between the measure and President Bush’s desk.
The 65–34 vote gave the Senate’s approval to the bill, which would make taking a pregnant girl to another state for the purposes of evading parental notification laws punishable by fines and up to a year in jail.
The girl and her parents would be exempt from prosecution, and the bill contains an exception for abortions performed in this manner when the pregnancy posed a threat to the mother’s life.
Struggling to defend their majority this election year, Republican sponsors said the bill supports what a majority of the public believes: that a parent’s right to know takes precedence over a young woman’s right to have an abortion.
“No parent wants anyone to take their children across state lines or even across the street without their permission,” Senate Majority Whip Mitch McConnell, a Republican of Kentucky, said. “This is a fundamental right, and the Congress is right to uphold it in law.”
Mr. Bush applauded the Senate action and urged the House and Senate to resolve their differences and send him a bill he said he would sign. “Transporting minors across state lines to bypass parental consent laws regarding abortion undermines state law and jeopardizes the lives of young women,” he said in a statement.
Fourteen Democrats and 51 Republicans voted for the bill. Four Republicans voted against it.