“The unspeakable violence of legally killing the unborn child in the womb has now been extended to a living baby mere inches from birth by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The 4th Circuit rejection of Virginia’s Partial-Birth Infanticide Law is another chilling example of raw judicial power,” Brenda Fastabend, Virginia Society for Human Life president commented.

The June 3rd ruling struck down by a vote of 2-1 Virginia’s law passed by the General Assembly in 2003. The Virginia statute defines when live birth occurs and bans the killing of a child who is born under the definition. The majority ruling struck the law as unconstitutional because it did not include a health-of-the-mother exemption which the opinion proclaimed was mandated under earlier U.S. Supreme Court rulings.

In his strong 28 page dissent, Circuit Court Judge Paul V. Niemeyer asserted that the differences in the 2003 Virginia law over earlier laws attempting to prohibit partial-birth abortions were ignored by the majority opinion, thereby establishing “a bold new law that, in essence, constitutionalizes infanticide of a most gruesome nature.”

According to Mrs. Fastabend, the Virginia Society for Human Life views the ruling as insufferable under the freedoms upon which our nation was founded and hopes that the office of the Attorney General will appeal the judicial extremism so evident in the ruling “all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary.”

Founded in 1967, Virginia Society for Human Life is the Virginia affiliate of National Right to Life Committee based in Washington.