Supreme Court sets Dec. 1 date to hear arguments on Mississippi abortion law

The Supreme Court will hear arguments Dec. 1 in a Mississippi law that could challenge the landmark Roe v. Wade.

Mississippi is asking the high court to uphold its ban on most abortions after the 15th week of pregnancy.

The Mississippi law was signed by Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant on March 19, 2018. The law was in effect less than 24 hours before a federal judge temporarily blocked it on March 20, 2018.

The state’s only abortion clinic, Jackson Women’s Health Organization, remains open and offers abortions up to 16 weeks into pregnancy. About 100 abortions a year are done after the 15th week, the providers told the Associated Press.

Mississippi’s ban permits an exception for threats to the life or “substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function” of the mother. It also allows an exception for a “severe fetal abnormality” that “is incompatible with life outside the womb.”

The state has told the court it should overrule Roe and the 1992 decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey that prevent states from banning abortion before viability, the point at which a fetus can survive outside the womb, around 24 weeks of pregnancy.

The high court’s major opinions that have controlled abortion law – Roe v. Wade in 1973 and Planned Parenthood v. Casey in 1992 – prohibit states from banning abortions before an unborn child is viable. The Roe decision legalized abortion nationwide, while Casey affirmed Roe but permitted some state regulation of the procedure.

The justices have said they will limit their ruling to whether, as the state told the court, “all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional.”

An opinion in support of the Mississippi 15-week ban could potentially overturn both Roe and Casey explicitly or severely undermine those decisions. The ruling is expected to be issued before the high court adjourns next summer.